BROOKLYN    AND    NEW  YORK. 


(IV 


UCSB   LIBRARY 


WM.    W.    S  WAYNE, 


INTENTION  AND  DISCOYEKY: 


Jfads 


WM.    W.    S WAYNE, 

BROOKLYN    AND     NEW    YORK. 


MURRAY  AND  GIBB,  EDINBURGH, 
PRINTERS  TO  HER  MAJESTY'S  STATIONERY  OFFICE. 


CONTENTS. 


FAGB 

Alchemists,  The  Lnst  of  the .  110 

Alpine  Perils — Professor  Forbes  on 30 

Amber  an  Article  of  International  Trade 66 

Amsterdam  Pile,  The 150 

Antiquity  of  Lightning  Conductors,  67 ;  of  Refined  Sugar      .  87 

Arkwright's  Spinning  Frame 128 

Art  of  Stereotype,  The 105 

Artesian  Well  of  Crenelle,  The 132 

Ascent  of  the  Jungfrau  Alp,  by  Forbes,  &c 44 

Astronomical  Shoemaker,  An 51 

Babbage's  Calculating  Machine 69 

Balloon  Travelling,  Rate  of 103 

Balloon  Voyage  from  London  to  Nassau 86 

Banks',  Sir  Joseph,  Balance 37 

Benefit  of  a  Wife  to  an  Author 40 

Black,  Dr.,  The  Death  of 133 

Brindley  the  Engineer 43 

Brongniart's  Early  Life 33 

Brougham's,  Lord,  Scientific  Blunders 90 

Buckingham  Palace  Gates 37 

Burning  Mirrors  of  Archimedes,  The 140 

Carnot  when  a  Child 23 

Catching  Electric  Eels 74 

Character  of  Engineers  in  their  Works 43 

Clearness  of  the  Sky  at  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope        ...  88 

Coal  Gas  in  Balloons,  Use  of 21 

Cocoa-Nut  Crab,  The 50 

Coffee-Tree,  Transportation  of  the 127 

Columbus'  own  Ship-Journal 70 

Crawshays  of  Merthyr  Tydvil,  The 15 

Cuvier,  Homage  to,  14 ;  and  Napoleon,  21 ;  Childhood  of,  25 ; 

in  London 39 

Davy,  Sir  Humphry,  Death  of,  13;  as  an  Angler      ...  93 

Deaf,  The,  How  they  may  Hear 68 

Decline  of  Science,  The 52 

Dee,  Dr.,  The  Necromancer 117 

Descartes'  "  Wooden  Daughter  " 51 

Descent  in  a  Diving  Bell,  A 92 

Diamonds,  Celebrated 114 

Discoveries  Anticipated 54 

Diving  Bell,  First  Use  of  the 103 

Drammond  Light,  The 62 

Drying  Wood  for  Violins 69 

Diymaking  in  Holland,  A    .                        137 

Early  Incitements  (Humboldt's)  to  Study  of  Nature         .       .  72 

Earthquakes,  in  Chile,  38 ;  How  to  Measure     ....  62 

Electricity,  The  Velocity  of 155 


6  CONTENTS. 

MM 

Electrifying  Machine  in  Persia,  An 60 

El  Dorado  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh 65 

Elgin  Marbles,  The 58 

Experiments  with  an  Electric  Eel 79 

False  Anticipations  of  Railway  Speed 14 

Faraday  as  a  Lecturer 88 

Female  Mathematician,  A  French 56 

Ferguson,  The  Wife  of  James 92 

Fireproof  House  on  Putney  Heath 109 

"  Fossil  Rain " 104 

Fourdrinier's  Paper-making  Machinery 48 

Fourier's  Independence 56 

Franklin's  Discoveries 22 

Gold  in  Siberia 83 

Gutta-percha,  Discovery  of 20 

Herschel's  Love  of  Music,  59 ;  his  First  Telescope,  75 ;  hia  Sister  94 

Holding  a  "  Craw's  Court " 80 

Hyena,  A  Tame 107 

India  Rubber  150  Years  Since 85 

Indian  Jugglers'  Secret,  The 106 

Invention  of  Gun  Cotton,  35;  of  the  Diving  Bell,  78;  of  the 

Hand  Gear 130 

Invisible  Despatch,  The  ....;...  107 

Jesuit's  Bark,  The  First  Use  of 51 

Kaleidoscope,  Sir  D.  Brewster's,  120 ;  Combinations  of  the,  84 ; 

The  First 91 

Leaning  Tower  of  Pisa,  The 29 

Leibnitz's  Last  Moments 21 

Lifting  Heavy  Persons 124 

Lighthouses,  Reflecting,  The  Origin  of 123 

Lion  Eaten  as  Food,  The 101 

Lithography,  The  Discovery  of 159 

London  as  a  Port 48 

Longevity  of  the  Beetle 102 

Magnetic  Correspondence  in  the  17th  Century  ....  142 

Mariner's  Compass,  The 156 

Marvels  of  the  Alchemists 129 

"  Means  to  the  End,"  The 84 

Mechanical  Triumphs 67 

Monochromatic  Painting 156 

Moon  Seen  through  Lord  Rosse's  Telescope,  The  .  .  .  101 

Mythology  of  Science,  The 64 

Navigation  before  the  Compass 144 

Necessity  the  Mother  of  Invention 136 

Newton's  Finger-Magnet 20 

Nice  Robbery,  A 55 

Observatory,  Ancient,  in  Persia 47 

Old  St.  Paul's,  A  Wrench  to 146 

Origin  of  Post  Paid  Envelopes 42 

Ostrich,  Enemies  of  the 108 

Parachute  Descent,  A  Safe 104 


CONTENTS.  7 

PAGE 

Pascal's  Childhood,  IS ;  How  he  Weighed  the  Atmosphere     .  28 

Perils  of  Chemical  Experiment 151 

Philosophical  Enthusiasm 31 

Poetic  Prophecies  of  Darwin  and  Milton 9 

Poker  across  the  Fire,  The 130 

Potato,  Introduction  of  the,  into  France 88 

Power  of  the  Lever 59 

Railway  System  Suggested,  The 89 

"  Gaining  Trees  "  at  the  Cape 106 

Raleigh,  Sir  Walter,  a  Chemist  .......  58 

Rapid  Manufacture  of  a  Coat 54 

Reason  for  Silence,  Fontaine's .  44 

Rosse's,  Lord,  Telescope 121 

Rust,  Protection  by 100 

St.  Pierre's  "  Paul  and  Virginia  " 62 

Scientific  Pilgrim,  A 139 

Self-taught  Mechanist,  A 149 

Semaphore  v.  Electric  Telegraph 146 

"  Shepherd  to  the  King  of  England  for  Scotland  "     .        .        .  32 

Siberian  Mammoth  Remains,  The 152 

Smeaton's  Independence,  23 ;  his  Reproof  of  Gaming      .        .  34 

Snow  Spectacles  of  the  Esquimaux 148 

Society  of  Arts,  Origin  of  the 125 

Spinning  Feats 128 

Steam-Gun  in  the  15th  Century 46 

Strychnine  a  Remedy  for  Paralysis 54 

Sun,  Total  Eclipse  of  the,  at  Cuba,  102 ;  Vast  Spot  on  the       .  12 

Talent  and  Opportunity 80 

Tea,  Identity  of  Black  and  Green,  99 ;  The  First  Cup  of,  Drunk 

in  England 40 

Tebreez,  Variable  Climate  of 52 

Telegraph,  Origin  of  the  Electric 134 

Telescope,  Invention  of  the 97 

Thames  Tunnel,  Construction  of  the 10 

Travelling  Carriage,  A  Novel 108 

Travelling  in  the  Himalaya  Mountains 82 

Travels  of  Volcanic  Dust 33 

Tropical  Delights,  Sydney  Smith's 79 

Tycho  Brahe,  Credulity  of 97 

Vast  Mirrors  Made  in  Russia 127 

Vicissitudes  of  Mining  in  Mexico 79 

Voyages  of  Manufactures 119 

Waste  of  Human  Life 123 

Watch  Melted  by  Lightning,  A 105 

Watt's  Discovery  of  the  Composition  of  Water  ....  26 

Weighing-Machine  at  the  Bank  of  England      ....  17 

"Wet  the  Ropes  1" 131 

Whitebait,  The  Rights  of 73 

Who  First  Doubled  the  Cape? 91 

Wonders  of  Australia,  Sydney  Smith  on  the     ....  76 

World  in  a  Drop  of  Water,  The 42 


NOTE. 

IN  the  annals  of  INVENTION  and  DISCOVERY,  it  may  be 
said  without  undue  boasting,  no  nation  of  modern 
times  can  lay  claim  to  such  an  eminent  position  as 
Great  Britain  ;  and  her  many  ingenious  and  intrepid 
adventurers  into  what  they  found  unknown  regions 
of  the  arts,  the  sciences,  and  the  earth's  surface,  have 
so  largely  contributed  to  raise  her  to  her  great  place 
and  power,  that  it  is  mere  justice  and  self-interest  to 
bestow  on  them  grateful  rewards  in  life,  and  renown 
after  death.  In  this  little  volume  are  brought  to- 
gether a  number  of  sketches  and  memoranda,  illus- 
trating the  history  of  discovery,  and  the  lives  and 
labours  of  inventors  and  explorers,  not  of  our  own 
country  alone,  but  of  others — for  knowledge  is  of  no 
country,  but  of  all.  The  object  of  the  collector  has 
been  rather  to  present  the  popular  than  the  strictly 
scientific  side  of  his  subject — to  furnish  materials  of 
interest  and  amusement,  as  well  as  instruction ;  and 
if  now  and  then  he  has  been  tempted  to  stray  into 
bye-paths  of  anecdote  and  gossip,  excuse  may  readily 
be  found  in  the  fact  that  the  private  life  of  our  men 
of  science,  often  singularly  noble  and  full  of  charac- 
ter, is  apt  to  be  altogether  obscured  by  the  brilliancy 
of  the  results  of  their  secret  and  silent  toil.  This 
volume  will  have  served  its  purpose,  if  it  excites  an 
appetite  for  fuller  and  deeper  inquisition  into  the 
sources  of  British  greatness  and  of  modern  civilisation. 


INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

CURIOUS  FACTS  AND  ILLUSTRATIVE 
SKETCHES. 


POETIC    PROPHECIES. 

IN  Dr.  Darwin's  Botanic  Garden,  first  published  in 
1789,  but  written,  it  is  well  known,  at  least  twenty 
years  before  the  date  of  its  publication,  occurs  the 
following  prediction  respecting  Steam  : — 
"  Soon  shall  thy  arm,  unconquer'd  Steam,  afar 
Drag  the  slow  barge,  or  drive  the  rapid  car ; 
Or,  on  wide-waving  wings  expanded  bear 
The  flying  chariot  through  the  fields  of  air,* 
Fair  crews  triumphant  leaning  from  above, 
Shall  wave  their  fluttering  'kerchiefs  as  they  move ; 
Or  warrior  bands  alarm  the  gaping  crowd, 
And  armies  shrink  beneath  the  shadowy  cloud : 
So  mighty  Hercules  o'er  many  a  clime 
Waved  his  huge  mace  in  virtue's  cause  sublime ; 
Unmeasured  strength  with  early  art  combined, 
Awed,  served,  protected,  and  amazed  mankind." 

A  distinguished  photographer  imagines  that  he  has 
traced  the  foreshadowing  of  his  delightful  science  in 
the  following  passage  from  our  great  epic  poet : 

"  With  one  touch  virtuous 
Th'  arch-chemic  sun,  so  far  from  us  remote, 
Produces."  Paradise  Lost,  b.  iii.  V.  608. 

*  Darwin  projected  an  "  aerial  steam-carriage,"  in  which  he 
proposed  to  use  wings  similar  to  those  of  a  bird,  to  which  motion 
was  to  be  given  by  a  gigantic  power  worked  by  high-pressure 
steam,  though  the  details  of  his  plan  were  not  bodied  forth. 


10         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

CONSTRUCTION  OF  THE  THAMES  TUNNEL. 
WHEN  the  ingenious  Miss  Pardoe  visited  Constanti- 
nople in  1836,  she  was  not  less  surprised  than  gratified 
by  the  inquiry  of  an  Albanian  chief,  as  to  the  probable 
completion  of  the  Thames  tunnel.  This,  however,  is 
but  one  of  the  many  instances  of  the  anxiety  with 
which  the  great  work  was  watched  throughout  conti- 
nental Europe.  In  Egypt,  too,  where  a  new  country 
is  rising,  phoenix-like,  upon  the  ashes  of  the  old  world, 
the  progress  of  the  tunnel  was  regarded  with  like 
curiosity ;  participated,  indeed,  throughout  the  civi- 
lised world.  This  interest  is  fully  attested  by  the 
visitors'  book  at  the  Tunnel,  wherein  are  inscribed  the 
names  of  scientific  men  belonging  to  nearly  every 
city  of  importance.  The  engineer  of  this  great  work, 
Mr.  (afterwards  Sir)  Mark  Isambard  Brunei,  completed 
his  design  in  1823  ;  and  amongst  those  who  then  re- 
garded it  as  practicable  were  the  Duke  of  Wellington 
and  the  late  Dr.  Wollaston.  The  works  were  com- 
menced in  1825,  and  the  Tunnel  itself  in  1826 ;  and  by 
March,  1827,  it  had  advanced  about  one-third  of  the 
whole  length.  All  proceeded  well  till  May  18,  when 
the  river  burst  into  the  Tunnel  with  such  velocity  and 
volume,  as  to  fill  it  in  fifteen  minutes  ;  but,  although 
the  men  were  at  work,  no  lives  were  lost.  The  hole, 
thirty-eight  feet  deep,  was  closed  with  bags  of  clay 
and  hazel-rods,  the  water  pumped  out,  and  the  works 
resumed  in  September.  On  Jan.  12,  1828,  the  river 
broke  in  a  second  time,  and  filled  the  Tunnel  in  less 
than  ten  minutes ;  when  the  rush  of  water  brought 


THE  THAMES  TUNNEL.  11 

with  it  a  strong  current  of  air  that  put  out  the  lights ; 
six  of  the  workmen  were  lost.  For  some  distance, 
Mr.  Brunei,  junior,  struggled  in  total  darkness,  and 
the  rush  of  the  water  carried  him  up  the  shaft.  The 
Tunnel  was  again  cleared,  and  the  part  completed 
found  to  be  sound.  Hundreds  of  plans  were  proposed 
for  its  completion ;  the  funds  of  the  company  were  too 
low  to  proceed,  and  above  5000/.  was  raised  by  public 
subscription.  <- 

For  seven  years  the  work  was  suspended;  but, 
by  advances  from  GoveBoment,  it  was  resumed  in  1835. 
On  April  23,  1837,  there  was  a  third  irruption  of  the 
river;  a  fourth  on  Nov.  2,  1837,  with  the  loss  of  one 
life ;  and,  on  March  6,  1838,  the  fifth  and  last  irruption 
took  place.  Thus,  of  the  tunnel  there  were  completed — 


In  1836  117  feet, 

—  1837  28  ., 

—  1838  ..     80  , 


In  1839  194  feet. 

—  1840  ..    76  , 


Leaving  only  60  feet  to 
complete. 

Meanwhile,  the  tunnel  works  proved  a  very  attractive 
exhibition.  In  1838,  they  were  visited  by  23,000 
persons,  and,  in  1839,  by  34,000.  By  Jan.  1841,  the 
tunnel  was  completed  from  shore  to  shore — 1140  feet, 
and  Sir  I.  Brunei,  on  Aug.  13,  was  the  first  to  pass 
through.  On  March  25,  1843,  the  tunnel  was  opened 
to  the  public,  with  a  demonstration  of  triumph. 

The  cost  of  the  work  has  been  nearly  four  times  the 
sum  at  first  contemplated;  the  actual  expense  being 
upwards  of  600,000?.  These,  of  course,  are  but  a  few 
data  of  the  great  work,  the  progress  of  which,  for 
twenty  years,  interested  every  admirer  of  scientific 


12         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

enterprize.  The  engineering  details  present  marvels 
of  ingenuity.  The  building  of  the  vast  brick  shaft, 
50  feet  in  diameter,  42  feet  in  height,  and  3  feet  thick, 
with,  set  over  it,  the  steam-engine  for  pumping  out  the 
water  and  raising  the  earth — and  the  sinking  of  the 
•whole,  en  masse,  into  the  Rotherhithe  bank,  were 
master- works  of  genius.  Thus  far  the  vertical  shaft: 
the  tunnel  itself  commenced  with  an  excavation  larger 
than  the  interior  of  the  old  House  of  Commons.  But 
the  great  invention  was  the  shield  apparatus — the  se- 
ries of  oells,  in  which,  as  the  miners  worked  at  one  end, 
the  bricklayers  formed  at  the  other  the  top,  sides,  and 
bottom  of  the  tunnel.  The  dangers,  too,  were  many : 
sometimes,  portions  of  the  frame  would  break,  with 
the  noise  of  a  cannon-shot;  then  alarming  cries 
were  heard,  as  some  irruption  of  earth  or  water  poured 
in ;  the  excavators  were,  however,  much  more  incon- 
venienced by  fire  than  water — gas  explosions  frequently 
wrapping  the  place  with  a  sheet  of  flame,  and  strangely 
mingling  with  the  water,  and  rendering  the  workmen 
insensible.  Yet,  with  all  these  perils,  but  seven  lives 
were  lost  in  making  the  tunnel  under  the  Thames; 
whereas,  nearly  forty  men  were  killed  in  building  the 
new  London  Bridge. — Note-book  of  1848. 

VAST    SPOT   ON   THE    SUN. 

SIB  JOHN  HERSCHEL,  when  at  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope,  observed,  on  May  25,  1837,  a  spot  upon  the  sun, 
the  black  centre  of  which  would  have  allowed  the  globe 
of  our  earth  to  drop  through  it,  leaving  a  thousand  miles 
clear  of  contact  on  all  sides  of  that  tremendous  gulf. 


DEATH  OF  SIR  HUMPHRY  DAVY.      13 

DEATH    OF    SIR   HUMPHRY   DAVY. 

IT  was  at  Rome,  on  the  20th  day  of  February,  1829, 
when  he  was  finishing  his  eloquent  work,  The  Last 
Days  of  a  Philosopher,  that  Sir  Humphry  Davy 
received  the  final  warning  to  prepare.  By  dictation, 
he  wrote  to  his  brother,  who  was  at  Malta  with  the 
British  troops — "  I  am  dying  from  a  severe  attack  of 
palsy,  which  has  seized  the  whole  of  the  body,  with 
the  exception  of  the  intellectual  organ.  I  shall  leave 
my  bones  in  the  Eternal  City."  But  he  was  to  die 
neither  then  nor  there.  Within  three  weeks,  his  bro- 
ther was  by  his  bedside,  and  found  him  as  much 
interested  in  the  anatomy  and  electricity  of  the  torpedo 
as  ever,  though  he  bade  Dr.  Davy  "  not  to  be  grieved" 
by  his  approaching  dissolution.  Yet,  after  a  day  of 
150  pulse-beats,  and  only  five  breathings  in  a  minute, 
and  of  the  most  distressing  particular  symptoms,  he 
again  revived.  Shortly  after  this,  Lady  Davy  arrived 
at  Rome  from  England,  with  a  copy  of  the  second 
edition  of  Salmonia,  which  Sir  Humphry  received  with 
peculiar  pleasure.  After  some  weeks  of  melancholy 
dalliance  with  the  balmy  spring  air  of  the  Campagna, 
the  Albula  Lake,  the  hills  of  Tivoli,  and  the  banks  of 
the  Tiber,  they  travelled  quietly  round  by  Florence, 
Genoa,  Turin,  slowly  threading  the  flowery,  sweet- 
scented  Alpine  valleys,  to  Geneva,  where  he  suddenly 
expired.  It  was  three  hours  beyond  midnight;  his 
servant  called  his  brother;  his  brother  was  in  time 
to  close  his  eyes.  It  was  the  29th  of  May,  in  1829. 
They  buried  him  at  Geneva.  In  truth,  Geneva 


14         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

buried  him  herself,  with  serious  and  respectful  cere- 
monial. A  simple  monument  stands  at  the  head  of  the 
hospitable  grave.  There  is  a  tablet  to  his  memory  on 
the  walls  of  Westminster  Abbey.  There  is  a  monu- 
ment also,  at  Penzance,  his  birth-place. 


HOMAGE    TO    CUVIER. 

WHEN  the  Count  de  Seze  replied  to  an  eloquent 
discourse  of  Cuvier,  he  stated  that,  "  since  the  Restora- 
tion, Cuvier  was  the  second  example  of  fortunate 
combination  of  literature  and  science,  and  that  he  had 
been  preceded  only  by  that  illustrious  geometer,  (the 
Marquis  de  Laplace),  whom  we  may  call  the  Newton 
of  France."  In  referring  to  the  European  reputation 
of  Cuvier,  and  to  the  vast  extent  and  variety  of  his 
knowledge,  he  applied  to  him  the  happy  observation 
which  Fontenelle  made  respecting  Leibnitz — that 
while  the  ancients  made  one  Hercules  out  of  several, 
we  might,  out  of  one  Cuvier,  make  several  philosophers. 


FALSE  ESTIMATE  OF  RAILWAY  SPEED. 
THE  ordinary  speed  of  George  Stephenson's  Killing  - 
worth  engine,  in  1814,  was  four  miles  an  hour.  In 
1825,  Mr.  Wood,  in  his  work  on  Railways,  took  the 
standard  at  six  miles  an  hour,  drawing  40  tons  on  a 
level ;  and  so  confident  was  he  that  he  gauged  the 
power  of  the  locomotive,  that  he  asserted — "  nothing 
could  do  more  harm  towards  the  adoption  of  railways 
than  the  promulgation  of  such  nonsense  as  that  we 
shall  see  locomotive  engines  travelling  at  the  rate  of 


THE CRAWSHAYS  OF MERTHYR  TYDVIL.  15 

12,  16,  18,  and  20  miles  an  hour."  The  promulgates 
of  such  nonsense  was  George  Stephenson.  In  1829,  it 
was  estimated  that,  at  15  miles  an  hour,  the  gross  load 
was  9£  tons,  and  the  net  load  very  little ;  and  that, 
therefore,  high  speed,  if  attainable,  was  perfectly  use- 
less. Before  the  end  of  that  year,  George  Stephenson 
got  with  "  the  Kocket"  a  speed  of  29£  miles  an  hour, 
carrying  a  net  load  of  9£  tons.  In  1831,  his  engines 
were  to  draw  90  tons  on  a  level,  at  20  miles  an  hour. 

When  the  speed  of  the  locomotive  was  set  beyond 
question,  prejudice  then  took  the  alarm  about  safety, 
and  a  very  strong  stand  was  from  time  to  time  made 
for  a  limitation  of  speed.  Even  after  the  year 
1849,  the  London  and  Birmingham  Directors  con- 
sidered that  20  miles  an  hour  was  enough  :  but  the 
vigour  of  the  broad  gauge  advocates  has  tripled 
the  working  power  of  the  locomotive,  and  given  us 
60  miles  an  hour  where  we  might  have  been  lingering 
at  20. 


THE    CRAWSHAYS    OF   MERTHYK   TYDVIL. 
MR.  CRAWSHAY,  of  the  Cyfarthfa  Works,  at  a  dinner 
given   to  him  in  1847,  by  the  people  of  Merthyr, 
related  the  following  account  of  the  rise  of  his  family  of 
"  Iron  Kings,"  as  they  are  called. 

"  My  grandfather  was  the  son  of  a  most  respectable 
farmer  in  Normanton,  Yorkshire.  At  ihe  age  of  15, 
father  and  son  differed.  My  grandfather,  an  enter- 
prising boy,  rode  his  own  pony  to  London,  then  an 
arduous  task  of  some  fifteen  or  twenty  days'  travelling. 
On  getting  there,  he  found  himself  perfectly  destitute 


16        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

of  friends.  He  sold  his  pony  for  157. ;  and  during 
the  time  that  the  proceeds  of  the  pony  kept  him,  he 
found  employment  in  an  iron  warehouse  of  London, 
kept  by  Mr.  Bicklewith.  He  hired  himself  for  three 
years  for  15/.,  the  price  of  his  pony.  His  occupation 
was  to  clean  the  counting-house,  to  put  the  desks  in 
order,  and  to  do  anything  else  that  he  was  told.  By 
industry,  integrity,  and  perseverance,  he  gained  his 
master's  favour,  and  was  termed  '  the  Yorkshire  Boy.' 
He  had  a  very  amiable  and  good  master ;  and,  before 
he  had  been  two  years  in  his  place,  he  stood  high  in 
this  just  man's  confidence.  The  trade  in  which  he  was 
engaged  was  only  a  cast-iron  warehouse,  and  his  mas- 
ter assigned  to  him,  '  the  Yorkshire  Boy,'  the  privilege 
of  selling  flat  irons — the  things  with  which  our  shirts 
and  clothes  are  flattened.  The  washerwomen  of  Lon- 
don were  sharp  folks ;  and  when  they  bought  one  flat- 
iron,  they  stole  two.  Mr.  Bicklewith  thought  that  the 
best  person  to  cope  with  them  would  be  a  man  working 
for  his  own  interest— and  a  Yorkshireman  at  the  same 
time.  That  was  the  first  matter  of  trading  that  ever 
my  grandfather  embarked  in.  By  honesty  and  perse- 
verance, he  continued  to  grow  in  favour.  His  master 
retired  in  a  few  years,  and  left  my  grandfather  in  pos- 
session of  his  cast-iron  business  in  London,  which  was 
carried  on  on  the  very  site  where  I  now  spend  my 
days — in  York  Yard.  My  grandfather  left  his  busi- 
ness in  London,  and  came  down  here  ;  and  my  father, 
who  carried  it  on,  supplied  him  with  money  almost  as 
fast  as  he  spent  it  here  ;  but  not  quite  so  fast.  "What 
occurred  subsequently,  this  company  knows  perfectly 


MACHINE  AT  THE  BANK  OF  ENGLAND.  17 

well.  Who  started  with  humbler  prospects  in  life  than 
my  grandfather  ?  No  man  in  this  room  is  so  poor 
but  that  he  can  command  1 51.  Depend  upon  it,  any 
man  who  is  industrious,  honest,  and  persevering,  will 
be  respected  in  any  class  of  life  he  may  move  in.  Do 
you,  think,  gentlemen,  there  is  a  man  in  England 
prouder  than  I  am  at  this  moment  ?  What  is  all  the 
world  to  me,  unless  they  know  me  ?" 


WEIGHING    MACHINE    AT    THE    BANK   OF 

ENGLAND. 

THE  most  interesting  place  connected  with  the  ma- 
chinery of  the  Bank  of  England  is  the  Weighing-Office, 
which  was  established  about  1840.  In  consequence 
of  a  proclamation  concerning  the  gold  circulation,  it 
became  very  desirable  to  obtain  the  most  minute  accu- 
racy, as  coins  of  different  weight  were  plentifully 
offered.  Many  complaints  were  made,  that  sovereigns 
which  had  been  issued  from  one  office  were  refused  at 
another ;  and  though  these  assertions  were  not,  perhaps, 
always  founded  on  truth,  yet  it  is  indisputable  that  the 
evil  occasionally  occurred.  Every  effort  was  made  by 
the  Directors  to  remedy  this,  some  millions  of  sove- 
reigns being  weighed  separately,  and  the  light  coins 
divided  from  those  which  were  full  weight.  Fortu- 
nately, the  Governor  for  the  time  being,  (Mr.  W. 
Cotton),  before  whom  the  complaints  principally  came, 
was  attached  to  scientific  pursuits ;  and  he  at  once 
turned  his  attention  to  discover  the  causes  which 
operated  to  prevent  the  attainment  of  a  just  weight. 
In  this  he  was  successful,  and  the  result  of  his  inquiry 


18         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

was,  a  machine,  remarkable  for  nn  almost  elegant 
simplicity.  About  80  or  100  light  and  heavy  sove- 
reigns are  placed  indiscriminately  in  a  round  tube  ;  as 
they  descend  on  the  machinery  beneath,  those  which 
are  light  receive  a  slight  touch,  which  moves  them 
into  their  proper  receptacle;  while  those  which  are  the 
legitimate  weight,  pass  into  their  appointed  place. 
The  light  coins  are  then  defaced  by  a  sovereign- 
cutting  machine,  remarkable  alike  for  its  accuracy  and 
rapidity.  By  this,  200  may  be  defaced  in  one  minute ; 
and,  by  the  weighing  machinery,  35,000  may  be 
weighed  in  one  day. 

An  eminent  member  of  the  Royal  Society  mentioned 
to  the  writer,  that,  amongst  scientific  men,  it  is  a 
question  whether  the  Weighing-Machine  of  Mr.  Cot- 
ton is  not  the  finest  thing  in  Mechanics ;  and  that 
there  is  only  one  other  invention  —  the  envelope- 
machine  of  De  la  Rue — to  be  named  with  it. — Francis's 
History  of  the  Bank  of  England. 

CHILDHOOD    OF    PASCAL. 

PASCAL,  the  celebrated  French  philosopher  and  divine, 
(whose  life,  Bayle  affirms,  is  worth  a  hundred  ser- 
mons), evinced  such  early  ardour  for  knowledge,  that, 
at  the  age  of  eleven,  he  was  ambitious  of  teaching  as  well 
as  learning;  and  he  then  composed  a  little  treatise  on 
the  refractions  of  the  sounds  of  vibrating  bodies  when 
touched  by  the  finger.  One  day  he  was  found  alone  in 
his  chamber,  tracing,  in  lines  of  coal,  geometrical  figures 
on  the  wall ;  and,  on  another  occasion,  he  was  surprised 
by  his  father,  just  when  he  had  succeeded  in  obtaining 


CHILDHOOD  OF  PASCAL.  19 

a  demonstration  of  the  32nd  proposition  of  the  first 
book  of  Euclid — that  the  three  angles  of  a  triangle  are 
equal  to  two  right  angles.  Astonished  and  overjoyed, 
his  father  rushed  to  his  friend,  M.  Pailleur,  to  an- 
nounce the  extraordinary  fact;  and  the  young  geometer 
was  instantly  permitted  to  study,  unrestrained,  the 
Elements  of  Euclid,  of  which  he  soon  made  himself 
master,  without  any  extrinsic  aid.  From  the  geometry 
of  planes  and  solids  he  passed  to  the  higher  branches 
of  the  science  ;  and,  before  he  was  sixteen  years  of  age, 
he  composed  a  treatise  on  the  Conic  Sections,  which 
evinced  the  most  extraordinary  sagacity.  When 
scarcely  19  years  of  age,  too,  Pascal  contrived  a  ma- 
chine to  assist  his  father  in  making  the  numerical 
calculations  which  his  official  duties  in  Upper  Nor- 
mandy required. 

In  later  life,  Pascal  found  researches  in  geometry  an 
occupation  well  fitted  to  give  serenity  to  a  heart 
bleeding  from  the  wounds  of  his  beloved  associates. 
He  had  long  before  renounced  the  study  of  the 
sciences ;  but  during  a  violent  attack  of  toothach,  which 
deprived  him  of  sleep,  the  subject  of  the  cycloid  forced 
itself  upon  his  thoughts.  Fermat,  Roberval,  and  others, 
had  trodden  the  same  ground  before  him  ;  but,  in  less 
than  eight  days,  and  under  severe  suffering,  he  disco- 
vered a  general  method  of  solving  this  class  of  pro- 
blems, by  the  summation  of  certain  series ;  and  as 
there  was  only  one  step  from  this  discovery  to  that  of 
Fluxions,  Pascal  might,  with  more  leisure  and  better 
health,  have  won  from  Newton  and  from  Leibnitz  the 
glory  of  that  great  invention. 


20         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

THE   DISCOVERER  OF  GDTTA  PERCHA. 

THE  Gutta  Percha  Tree,  or  Gutta  Tuban,  as  it  ought 
more  properly  to  be  called — the  Percha  being  a  spu- 
rious article — abounds  in  the  indigenous  forests  of 
Singapore,  although  it  was  only  about  the  year  1840 
that  it  was  discovered  by  Europeans.  The  first  notice 
taken  of  it  appears  to  have  been  by  Dr.  W.  Montgo- 
merie,  in  a  letter  to  the  Bengal  Medical  Board,  in  the 
beginning  of  1843,  wherein  he  commends  the  sub- 
stance as  likely  to  prove  useful  for  some  surgical 
purposes ;  and  supposes  it  to  belong  to  the  Fig  tribe. 
In  April,  1843,  the  substance  was  taken  to  Europe  by 
Dr.  D.  Almeida,  who  presented  it  to  the  Royal  Society 
of  Arts  of  London  ;  but  it  did  not  at  first  attract  much 
attention,  as  the  Society  simply  acknowledged  the 
receipt  of  the  gift.  Its  uses  would  rather  appear  to  have 
been  found  out  by  the  Malays,  who  first  manufactured 
some  of  the  Gutta  Percha  into  whips,  and  brought 
them  into  the  town  at  Singapore  for  sale,  where  they 
were  seen  by  Europeans. 


SIR  ISAAC  NEWTON'S  MAGNET. 

THE  smallest  natural  Magnets  generally  possess  the 
greatest  proportion  of  attractive  power.  Sir  Isaac 
Newton  wore  in  his  ring  a  magnet  which  weighed 
only  three  grains;  yet  it  was  able  to  take  up  746 
grains,  or  nearly  250  times  its  own  weight — whereas 
magnets  weighing  above  two  pounds  seldom  lift  more 
than  five  or  six  times  their  own  weight. 


LAST  MOMENTS  OF  LEIBNITZ.        21 

COAL  GAS  IN  BALLOONS. 

ME.  GREEN  has  the  merit  of  being  the  first  person 
•who  made  experiments  on  the  buoyant  properties  of 
Coal  Gas.  In  some  of  his  preliminary  trials,  he  ascer- 
tained that  the  ascensive  force  of  a  small  balloon,  three 
feet  in  diameter,  was  equal  to  eleven  ounces ;  but, 
when  filled  in  the  old  way,  with  hydrogen  gas,  not 
more  than  fifteen  ounces. 

CUVIER   AND    NAPOLEON. 

AFTER  Cuvier  had  presented  to  Buonaparte,  in  a  Coun- 
cil of  State,  his  Report  of  the  Progress  of  the  Mathe- 
matical and  Natural  Sciences  since  the  year  1789,  the 
Emperor  expressed,  in  a  very  happy  manner,  the 
satisfaction  which  he  had  received  from  the  document. 
"  He  has  praised  me,"  said  Napoleon,  "  as  I  like  to  be 
praised."  Cuvier,  however,  as  he  himself  said,  had 
only  invited  the  Emperor  to  imitate  Alexander,  and  to 
employ  his  power  in  promoting  the  advancement  of 
the  natural  sciences. 


LAST   MOMENTS    OF   LEIBNITZ. 
THE  passing  of  the  mighty  spirit  of  Leibnitz  from  this 
scene  of  existence  was  a  deeply  impressive  scene.    He 
had  suffered  from  occasional  illness  during  several 
preceding  years.       These    attacks,   however,   passed 
away,  and  the  philosopher  resumed   his  speculations 
with  renewed  energy.     In  November,  1716,  his  com- 
plaint returned  with  great  violence. 
"The  closing  scene  suggests  gloomy  reflections,  as  the  lurid 


22        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

glare,  which,  during  his  extraordinary  life,  had  attracted  the 
eyes  of  the  world,  disappears ;  while  we  have  not  the  record  we 
could  desire,  indicating  that  the  moral  sensibilities  of  the  Philo- 
sopher were  rightly  alive  to  the  decisive  nature  of  the  awful 
change.  His  seventy  years  are  ended,  and  the  lightning  seems 
lost  among  dark  clouds.  During  the  last  day  of  his  life,  we  are 
told,  he  was  buried  in  conversation  with  his  physician  on  the 
nature  of  his  disease,  and  on  the  doctrines  of  alchymy.  Towards 
evening,  his  servant  asked  him  if  he  would  receive  the  Eucharist. 
'  Let  me  alone,'  suid  he,  '  I  have  done  ill  to  no  one.  •  I  have 
nothing  (o  confess.  All  must  die.'  He  raised  himself  on  his 
bed,  and  tried  to  write.  The  darkness  of  death  was  gathering 
around  him.  He  found  himself  unable  to  read  what  he  had 
written.  He  tore  the  paper,  and,  lying  down,  covered  his  face, 
and  a  few  minutes  after  9  o'clock,  on  the  evening  of  the  14th  of 
November,  17 1C,  he  ceased  to  breathe  !  It  is  most  solemn  to 
contemplate  a  human  spirit,  whose  course  of  thought  throughout 
life  was  unsurpassed  for  power  of  speculation,  and  daring  range 
of  mind  among  the  higher  objects  of  knowledge,  and  which,  at 
the  period  of  its  departure,  was  in  the  depths  of  a  controversy 
about  the  mysteries  of  a  supersensible  world — thus  summoned 
into  that  world,  to  become  conversant  in  its  final  relations  with 
that  Being  who  had  entrusted  it  with  such  mental  power,  and 
whose  nature  and  attributes  had  so  often  tasked  its  speculative 
energies." — North  British  Review. 


1'KANKLIN  S    DISCOVERIES. 

Or  all  this  great  man's  scientific  -  excellencies,  the 
most  remarkable  is  the  smallness,  the  simplicity,  the 
apparent  inadequacy  of  the  means  which  he  employed 
in  his  experimental  researches.  His  discoveries  were 
all  made  with  hardly  any  apparatus  at  all ;  and  if,  at 
any  time,  he  had  been  led  to  employ  instruments  of  a 
somewhat  less  ordinary  description,  he  never  rested 
satisfied  until  he  had,  as  it  were,  afterwards  translated 
the  process,  by  resolving  the  problem  with  such  simple 
machinery,  that  you  might  say  he  had  done  it  wholly 


SMEATON'S  INDEPENDENCE.          23 

unaided  by  apparatus.  The  experiments  by  which 
the  identity  of  lightning  and  electricity  was  demon- 
strated, were  made  with  a  sheet  of  brown  paper,  a 
bit  of  twine  or  silk  thread,  and  an  iron  key ! — Lord 
Brougham. 


CARNOT,   WHEN   A   CHILD. 

THE  aptitude  and  taste  for  military  affairs  of  Carnot, 
destined  afterwards  to  perform  so  important  a  part  in 
the  history  of  Europe,  displayed  itself  in  a  singular 
manner  while  he  was  yet  a  child.  Being  taken  for  the 
first  time  to  a  theatre,  where  some  siege  or  other  warlike 
operation  was  represented,  he  astonished  the  audience 
by  interrupting  the  piece  to  complain  of  the  manner 
in  which  the  general  had  disposed  his  men  and  his 
guns,  crying  out  to  him  that  his  men  were  in  fire,  and 
loudly  calling  upon  him  to  change  his  position.  In 
fact,  the  men  were  so  placed  as  to  be  commanded  by 
a  battery. 

SMEATON'S  INDEPENDENCE. 

SMEATON,  the  engineer,  often  evinced  a  high  feeling 
of  independence  in  respect  to  pecuniary  matters,  and 
would  never  allow  motives  of  emolument  to  interfere 
with  plans  laid  on  other  considerations.  The  Empress 
Catherine  of  Russia  was  exceedingly  anxious  to  have 
his  services  in  the  formation  of  great  engineering 
works  in  her  dominions,  and  she  commissioned  the 
Princess  Dackshaw  to  offer  him  his  own  terms,  if  he 
would  accede  to  her  proposal.  But  his  plans  and  his 


21         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

heart  were  bent  upon  the  exercise  of  his  skill  in  his 
own  country,  and  he  steadily  refused  all  the  offers 
made  to  him.  It  is  reported  that  when  the  Princess 
found  her  attempts  unavailing,  she  said  to  him,  "  Sir, 
you  are  a  great  man,  and  I  honour  you.  You  may  have 
an  equal  in  abilities,  perhaps,  but  in  character  you 
stand  single.  The  English  minister,  Sir  Robert  Wal- 
'pole,  was  mistaken ;  and  my  sovereign,  to  her  loss, 
finds  one  who  has  not  his  price." 

After  Smeaton  had  retired  from  his  profession,  he 
was  often  pressed  to  superintend  certain  works  ;  when 
these  entreaties  were  backed  by  personal  offers  of 
emolument,  he  used  to  send  for  an  old  woman  who 
took  care  of  his  chambers  in  Gray's  Inn,  and  say, 
"  Her  attendance  suffices  for  all  my  wants  !"  a  reply 
which  conveyed  the  intimation  that  a  man  whose  per- 
sonal wants  were  so  simple,  was  not  likely  to  break 
through  a  pre-arranged  line  of  conduct  for  mere  pecu- 
niary considerations. 

Smeaton's  magnum  opus  is  the  Eddystone  light- 
house, which  has  withstood  the  storms  of  more  than 
a  century.  One  of  its  severest  perils  was  in  a  terrific 
hurricane  in  November,  1824,  when  the  men  in  the 
lighthouse  appear  to  have  been  in  a  most  critical  situa- 
tion ;  alive  to  their  danger,  and  conscious  of  being 
beyond  the  hope  of  human  aid.  The  report  made  by 
one  of  the  light-keepers  states,  that  on  the  morning 
of  the  23rd,  "  the  sea  was  tremendous,  and  broke  with 
such  violence  on  the  top  and  round  the  building,  as  to 
demolish  in  an  instant  five  panes  of  the  lantern  glass, 
and  sixteen  cylinder  glasses,  the  former  of  unusual 


CHILDHOOD  OF  CUVIER,  25 

thickness.  The  house  shook  with  so  much  violence 
as  to  occasion  considerable  motion  of  the  cylinder 
glasses  fixed  in  the  lamps ;  and  at  times  the  whole 
building  appeared  to  sway  as  if  resting  on  an  elastic 
body.  The  water  came  from  the  top  of  the  edifice  in 
such  quantities  that  we  were  overwhelmed,  and  the 
sea  made  a  breach  from  the  top  of  the  house  to  the 
bottom." 

CHILDHOOD    OF    CUVIER. 

CUVIER,  like  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  was  born  with  such 
a  feeble  and  sickly  constitution,  that  he  was  scarcely 
expected  to  reach  the  years  of  manhood.  His  affec- 
tionate mother  watched  over  his  varying  health,  in- 
stilled into  his  rnind  the  first  lessons  of  religion,  and 
had  taught  him  to  read  fluently  before  he  had  com- 
pleted his  fourth  year.  She  made  him  repeat  to  her 
his  Latin  lessons,  though  ignorant  herself  of  the  lan- 
guage ;  she  conducted  him  every  morning  to  school ; 
made  him  practise  drawing  under  her  own  superinten- 
dence, and  supplied  him  with  the  best  works  on  his- 
tory and  literature.  His  father  had  destined  him  for 
the  army.  In  the  library  of  the  Gymnasium,  where 
he  stood  at  the  head  of  the  classes  of  history,  geo- 
graphy, and  mathematics,  he  lighted  upon  a  copy  of 
Gesner's  History  of  Animals  and  Serpents,  with  co- 
loured plates ;  and,  about  the  same  time,  he  had  dis- 
covered a  complete  copy  of  Buffon  among  the  books 
of  one  of  his  relatives.  His  taste  for  Natural  History 
now  became  a  passion.  He  copied  the  figures  which 
these  works  contained,  and  coloured  them  in  conformity 


26         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

with  the  descriptions ;  whilst  he  did  not  overlook  the 
intellectual  beauties  of  his  author. 

In  the  fourteenth  year  of  his  age  he  was  appointed 
president  of  a  society  of  his  schoolfellows,  which 
he  was  the  means  of  organising,  and  of  which  he 
drew  up  the  rules ;  and  seated  on  the  foot  of  his  bed, 
which  was  the  president's  chair,  he  first  showed  his 
oratorical  powers  in  the  discussion  of  various  ques- 
tions, suggested  by  the  reading  of  boots  of  natural 
history  and  travels,  which  was  the  principal  object  of 
the  society. 

When  at  the  age  of  nineteen,  the  casual  dissection 
of  a  colmar,  a  species  of  cuttle-fish,  induced  Cuvier  to 
study  the  anatomy  of  the  mollusca;  and  the  examina- 
tion of  some  fossil  terebratulse,  which  had  been  dug 
up  near  Fecamp,  in  June,  1791,  suggested  to  him  the 
idea  of  comparing  fossil  with  living  animals  ;  and  thus, 
as  he  himself  said,  "  the  germ  of  his  two  most  impor- 
tant labours — the  comparison  of  fossil  with  living 
species,  and  the  reform  of  the  classification  of  the 
animal  kingdom — had  their  origin  at  this  epoch." 


WATTS    DISCOVERY    OF   THE    COMPOSITION 
OF  WATER. 

A  CONTROVERSY  a  good  many  years  ago  agitated  the 
philosophical  world,  as  to  the  discovery  of  the  Compo- 
sition of  Water — whether  the  merit  was  due  to  Watt  or 
Cavendish.  One  of  Watt's  letters,  dated  May  15th, 
1784,  seems  to  compress  the  matter  into  a  nutshell. 
Writing  to  his  friend,  Mr.  Fry  of  Bristol,  Mr.  Watt 


THE  COMPOSITION  OF  WATER.        27 

says,  that  "  he  has  had  the  honour  of  having  had  his 
ideas  pirated  ;"  that  Dr.  Blagden  explained  his  theory 
to  Lavoisier,  at  Paris ;  that  M.  Lavoisier  soon  after 
invented  it  himself;  and  that  "since  that,  Mr.  Caven- 
dish has  read  a  paper  to  the  Royal  Society  on  the  same 
idea,  without  making  the  least  mention  of  me."  "  The 
one,"  he  continues,  "  is  a  French  financier,  and  the 
other  a  member  of  the  illustrious  house  of  Cavendish, 
worth  above  100,000?.  (1,000,000/.)  and  does  not  spend 
WOOL  a  year.  Rich  men  may  do  mean  actions ;  may 
you  and  I  always  persevere  in  our  integrity,  and  de- 
spise such  doings." 

Another  important  point  is,  that  Watt  and 
Cavendish's  papers  on  the  discovery  were  printed  under 
the  sole  superintendence  of  Dr.  Blagden,  secretary  to 
the  Royal  Society ;  that  Mr.  Watt's  paper  is  printed 
with  the  erroneous  date  of  1784,  in  place  of  1783,  and 
that  the  separate  copies  of  Mr.  Cavendish's  papers  have 
the  erroneous  date  of  1783,  in  place  of  1784.  The  ob- 
vious effect  of  these  two  errors  was  to  give  Cavendish 
the  priority  over  Watt ;  whereas,  by  written  testimony, 
Watt's  theory  is  proved  to  have  been  known  to  Priest- 
ley in  1782. 

It  is  Dr.  Blagden's  conduct  in  the  matter  that  has 
disturbed  the  current  of  scientific  history.  "  It  is  his 
testimony,"  says  an  able  writer  in  the  North  British 
Review,  "  not  appealed  to  by  Cavendish,  but  gra- 
tuitously offered  by  himself,  that  contains  the  allega- 
tion that  Cavendish  mentioned  to  him  and  others  his 
conclusions.  It  is  his  testimony,  gratuitously  sent  to 
Crell,  that  deprives  the  French  chemists,  Lavoisier, 


28        IN  VENT1  ON  AND  DISCO  VER  Y. 

Laplace,  and  Monge,  of  their  due  share  of  honou? ; 
and  it  was  by  his  acts  that  erroneous  dates  and  claims 
were  propagated  throughout  Europe.  Let  us  impanel, 
then,  a  British  jury— not  of  chemists,  for  their  verdict 
is  given— not  of  the  improvers  or  manufacturers  of 
steam-engines,  for  they  might  be  partial — but  of  the 
highest  functionaries  of  the  law,  the  members  of  the 
peerage — let  us  lay  before  them  these  facts,  and  then 
tell  them  that  Blngden  received  an  annuity  of  500/. 
from  Cavendish ;  that,  at  his  death,  he  left  him  a 
legacy  of  15,OOOZ. ;  and  we  will  answer  for  it,  that  the 
testimony  of  Blagden  will  be  rejected,  and  the  priority 
of  Watt  affirmed." 

HOW  PASCAL  WEIGHED  THE  ATMOSPHERE. 
PASCAL'S  Treatise  on  the  weight  of  the  whole  mass  of 
air  forms  the  basis  of  the  modern  science  of  Pneu- 
matics. In  order  to  prove  that  the  mass  of  air  presses 
by  its  weight  on  all  the  bodies  which  it  surrounds, 
and  also  that  it  is  elastic  and  compressible,  he  carried 
a  balloon,  half  filled  with  air,  to  the  top  of  the  Puy  de 
Dome,  a  mountain  about  500  toises  above  Clermont, 
in  Auvergne.  It  gradually  inflated  itself  as  it  as- 
cended, and  when  it  reached  the  summit,  it  was  quite 
full,  and  swollen  as  if  fresh  air  had  been  blown  into 
it ;  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  it  swelled  in  proportion 
as  the  weight  of  the  column  of  air  which  pressed  upon 
it  was  diminished.  When  again  brought  down,  it 
became  more  and  more  flaccid,  and  when  it  reached  the 
battom,  it  resumed  its  original  condition.  In  the  nine 
chapters  of  which  the  Treatise  consists,  Pascal  shows 


THE  LEANING  TOWER  OF  PISA.        29 

that  all  the  phenomena  and  effects  hitherto  ascribed  to 
the  horror  of  a  vacuum  arise  from  the  weight  of  the 
mass  of  air  ;  and  after  explaining  the  variable  pressure 
of  the  atmosphere  in  different  localities,  and  in  its  dif- 
ferent states,  and  the  rise  of  water  in  pumps,  he  cal- 
culates that  the  whole  mass  of  air  round  our  globe 
weighs  8,983,889,440,000,000,000  French  pounds. 


THE  LEANING  TOWER  OF  PISA.* 
SIR  JOHN  LESLIE  used  to  attribute  the  stability  of 
this  tower  to  the  cohesion  of  the  mortar  it  is  built 
with  being  sufficient  to  maintain  it  erect,  in  spite  of 
its  being  out  of  the  condition  required  by  physics — 
to  wit,  that  "  in  order  that  a  column  shall  stand,  a  per- 

*  "When  at  Pisa,  many  years  since,  Captain  Basil  Hall  inves- 
tigated the  origin  and  divergence  of  the  tower  from  the  per- 
pendicular, and  established  completely  to  his  own  satisfaction 
that  it  had  been  built  from  top  to  bottom,  originally,  just  as  it 
now  stands.  His  reasons  for  thinking  so  are,  that  the  line  of  the 
tower,  on  that  side  towards  whicli  it  leans,  has  not  the  same 
curvature  as  the  line  on  the  opposite,  or  what  may  be  called  the 
upper  side.  If  the  tower  had  been  built  upright,  and  then  been 
made  to  incline  over,  the  line  of  the  wall  on  that  side  towards 
which  the  inclination  was  given,  would  be  more  or  less  concave 
in  that  direction,  owing  to  the  nodding  or  "  swagging  over"  of 
the  top,  by  the  simple  action  of  gravity  acting  on  a  very  tall 
mass  of  masonry,  which  is  more  or  less  elastic  when  placed  in 
a  sloping  position.  But  the  contrary  is  the  fact ;  for  the  line  of 
wall  on  the  side  towards  which  the  tower  leans,  is  decidedly 
more  convex  than  the  opposite  side.  Captain  Hall  has,  there- 
fore, no  doubt  whatever  that  the  architect,  in  rearing  his  suc- 
cessive courses  of  stones,  gained  or  stole  a  little  at  each  layer, 
BO  as  to  render  his  work  less  and  less  overhanging  as  he  went 
up ;  and  thus,  without  betraying  what  he  was  about,  really 
gained  stability. 


30        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

pendicular  let  fall  from  the  centre  of  gravity  must  fall 
within  the  base."  Sir  John  describes  the  column  of 
Pisa  to  be  in  violation  of  this  principle  ;  but,  according 
to  designs  shown  to  Dr.  Gumming,  at  Pisa,  in  1836, 
the  perpendicular  does  fall  within  the  base. 

HOLDING  A  "  CRAWS'  COURT." 
DR.  EDMOKSTON  in  his  interesting  '•'•View  of  the  Zetland 
Islands"  relates  that  the  hooded  Crow  sometimes  en- 
gages in  merry  meetings,  but,  savage-like,  concludes 
by  a  sanguinary  sacrifice.  The  crows  generally  ap- 
pear in  pairs,  even  during  winter,  except  when  at- 
tracted to  a  spot  in  search  of  food,  or  when  they 
assemble  for  the  purpose  of  holding  what  is  called  a 
Craws'  Court.  This  latter  institution  exhibits  a 
curious  fact  in  their  history.  Numbers  are  seen  to 
assemble  on  a  particular  hill  or  field,  from  many  dif- 
ferent parts.  On  some  occasions,  the  meeting  does  not 
appear  complete  before  the  expiration  of  a  day  or  two. 
As  soon  as  all  the  deputies  have  arrived,  a  very  gene- 
ral noise  and  croaking  ensue ;  and  shortly  aft  r,  the 
whole  fall  upon  one  or  two  individuals,  whom  they 
persecute  and  beat  until  they  kill  them.  When  this 
has  been  accomplished,  they  quietly  disperse. 


ALPINE    PERILS. 

STRANGE  incidents  befel  Professor  Forbes,  and  his 
companions,  in  their  travels  through  the  Alps  of 
Savoy.  On  one  occasion,  they  got  so  near  a  thunder- 
cloud, as  to  be  highly  electrified  by  induction,  witfc 


PHILOSOPHICAL  ENTHUSIASM.        31 

till  the  angular  stones  round  them  hissing  like  points 
near  a  powerful  electrical  machine ;  on  another,  whilst 
crossing  one  of  the  loftiest  passes,  the  Col  de  Collon, 
they  discovered  a  dark  object  lying  on  the  snow, 
which  proved  to  be  the  body  of  a  man,  with  the  clothes 
hard-frozen  and  uninjured.  "The  effect  on  us  all," 
says  the  Professor,  "  was  electric  ;  and  had  not  the  sun 
shone  forth  in  its  full  glory,  and  the  very  wilderness 
of  eternal  snow  seemed  gladdened  under  the  serenity  01 
such  a  summer's  day,  as  is  rare  at  these  heights,  we 
should  certainly  have  felt  a  deeper  thrill,  arising  from 
the  sense  of  personal  danger.  As  it  was,  when  we  had 
recovered  our  first  surprise,  and  interchanged  our 
expression  of  sympathy  for  the  poor  traveller,  and 
gazed  with  awe  on  the  disfigured  relics  of  one  who  had 
so  lately  been  in  the  same  plight  with  ourselves,  we 
turned  and  surveyed,  with  a  stronger  sense  of  sub- 
limity than  before,  the  desolation  by  which  we  were 
surrounded ;  and  became  still  more  sensible  of  our 
isolation  from  human  dwellings,  human  help,  and 
human  sympathy,  our  loneliness  with  nature,  and  as  it 
were,  the  more  immediate  presence  of  God." 


PHILOSOPHICAL  ENTHUSIASM. 
"  NEVER  shall  I  forget,"  says  Agassiz,  "  the  impres- 
sion which  the  sight  of  the  Pterichthys,  provided  with 
appendages  resembling  wings,  produced  upon  me, 
when  I  assured  myself  that  it  belonged  to  the  class  of 
fishes.  It  was  an  entirely  new  type,  which  was  about 
to  figure,  for  the  first  time  since  it  had  ceased  to  exist, 


32        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

in  the  scries  of  beings— again  to  form  a  link  which 
nothing  of  all  that  had  been  revealed  up  to  the  time, 
with  regard  to  extinct  creations,  would  have  led  us 
ever  to  suspect  the  existence  of — showing  forcibly  that 
observation  alone  can  lead  us  to  the  recognition  of  the 
laws  of  development  of  organized  beings  ;  and  how 
much  we  should  guard  against  all  those  systems  of 
transformation  of  species,  which  the  imagination  in- 
vents with  as  much  facility  as  reason  refutes  them." 


"  SHEPHEKD    TO    THE    KING    OF    ENGLAND    FOR 

SCOTLAND." 

LALANDE,  the  celebrated  astronomer,  committed  a 
ludicrous  mistake  in  styling  James  Ferguson,  Berger 
du  Hoi  cTAngletcrre  en  Ecosse,  the  King  of  England's 
Shepherd  for  Scotland.  The  matter  has,  however,  been 
thus  explained : — Daubenton,  as  a  naturalist,  had  the 
charge  of  the  royal  flocks  of  sheep  in  France.  In  order 
to  retain  his  situation  under  the  republic,  he  required 
a  certificate  of  civism  from  the  Section  of  the  Sans 
Culottes.  In  this  curious  document,  he  is  called  the 
Shepherd  Daubenton.  Lalande,  whose  great  work  on 
astronomy  was  published  at  this  period,  had  seen  James 
Ferguson  (the  astronomer)  designated  the  Shepherd, 
probably  to  distinguish  him  from  Adam  Ferguson  the 
Philosopher,  ai:d  hence  he  placed  Ferguson  the  Shepherd 
in  the  same  category  with  the  Shepherd  Daubenton, 
and  made  him  "  Shepherd  to  the  King  of  England  foi 
Scotland !" 


ALEXANDER  BRONGNIART.  33 

TRAVELS  OF  VOLCANIC  DUST. 
ON  the  2nd  of  September,  1845,  a  quantity  of  volcanic 
dust  fell  in  the  Orkney  Islands,  which  was  supposed 
to  have  originated  in  an  eruption  of  Hecla  in  Iceland. 
It  was  subsequently  ascertained  that  an  eruption  of 
Hecla  took  place  on  the  morning  of  the  above-named 
day,  so  as  to  leave  no  doubt  of  the  justness  of  the  con- 
clusion. The  dust  had  thus  travelled  about  600  miles  ! 


EARLY   LIFE    OF   ALEXANDER    BRONGNIART. 

THIS  celebrated  chemist  and  mineralogist,  upwards  of 
forty  years  director  of  the  porcelain  manufactory  of 
Sevres,  was  born  at  Paris  in  1770.  His  father  was 
justly  celebrated  for  his  attainments  in  the  fine  arts. 
His  mind  developed  itself  in  the  midst  of  that  brilliant 
society  belonging  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, which  his  father  was  accustomed  to  draw  around 
him.  He  there  derived,  from  conversations  with 
Franklin,  the  germ  of  that  mild  and  practical  philoso- 
phy which  he  never  abandoned ;  and  from  those  of 
Lavoisier  his  earliest  notions  of  chemistry,  which 
formed  one  of  the  foundations  of  his  scientific  career. 
He  gave  early  indications  of  that  clearness  of  elocu- 
tion which  formed  one  of  his  merits  as  a  professor ; 
and  it  is  related  that  Lavoisier  himself  took  pleasure 
in  listening  to  a  lecture  on  chemistry  delivered  by 
Brongniart  even  when  he  was  scarcely  fifteen  years  of 
age.  He  studied  in  the  Ecole  de  Medecine,  where  he 


3-1        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

was  thrice  enrolled ;  and  when  every  Frenchman  was 
called  to  the  frontier,  he  was  connected  to  the  army  of 
the  Pyrenees  in  the  capacity  of  an  apothecary.  A  stay 
of  fifteen  months  among  these  mountains  gave  him  the 
opportunity  of  studying  a  rich  and  varied  field  of  na- 
ture, as  a  zoologist  and  botanist.  He  likewise  made 
geological  observations,  which,  at  a  later  period,  took 
their  place  in  the  science,  and  which  he  often  took 
pleasure  in  recalling;  but  there  he  encountered  dangers 
which  his  youth  did  not  suspect,  and  he  was  im- 
prisoned under  suspicion  of  having  favoured  the 
escape  of  the  skilful  naturalist,  Broussonnet,  who 
avoided  certain  death  by  fleeing  by  the  breach  of 
Holland.  Restored  to  liberty  after  the  9th  Thermidor, 
Brongniart  returned  to  Paris,  and,  in  1800,  was  nomi- 
nated director  of  the  porcelain  manufactory  of  Sevres, 
on  the  recommendation  of  Berthollet.  At  nineteen 
years  of  age,  Brongniart  was  one  of  the  founders  of  the 
Societe  Philomatique,  which,  at  the  period  of  proscrip- 
tion for  all  of  a  higher  class,  kept  alive  the  sacred 
flame  of  science.  He  died  in  1847,  and  at  his  funeral, 
on  October  9th,  M.  Elie  de  Beaumont  delivered  an 
eloge,  whence  these  details  have  been  derived. 


SMEATON'S  REPROOF  OF  GAMING. 

SMEATON,  the  engineer,  was  on  intimate  terms  of  ac- 
quaintance with  the  Duke  and  Duchess  of  Queensbury, 
and  often  spent  a  leisure  hour  in  the  evening  at  their 
house.  On  a  few  occasions,  he  played  at  cards  with 
them,  and  on  one  such  evening,  he  effected  the  aboli- 


INVENTION  OF  GUN-COTTON.         35 

tion  of  that  inconsiderate,  indiscriminate  play  amongst 
people  of  superior  rank  or  fortune,  which  compels  every 
one  to  join,  and  at  their  own  stake  too.  Smeaton  de- 
tested cards,  and  his  attention  never  following  the  game : 
he  played  like  a  boy.  The  game  was  Pope  Joan ;  and 
the  general  run  of  it  was  high  ;  and  the  stake  in  Pope 
had  accumulated  to  a  serious  sum.  It  was  Smeaton's 
turn  by  the  deal  to  double  it ;  when,  regardless  of  his 
cards,  he  busily  made  minutes  on  a  slip  of  paper,  and 
put  it  on  the  board.  The  Duchess  eagerly  inquired 
what  it  was ;  and  he  as  coolly  replied,  "  Your  grace 
will  recollect  the  field  in  which  my  house  stands  may 
be  about  five  acres,  three  roods,  and  seven  perches ; 
which,  at  thirty  years'  purchase,  will  be  just  my  stake  ; 
and  if  -your  grace  will  make  a  duke  of  me,  I  presume 
the  winner  will  not  dislike  my  mortgage."  The  joke 
and  the  lesson  had  alike  their  weight ;  and  the  party 
never  after  played  but  for  the  merest  trill e, 


INVENTION    OF    GUN-COTTON. 

COTTON,  having  largely  contributed  to  our  national 
prosperity  in  times  of  peace,  promised,  not  long  since, 
to  play  a  very  important  part  in  the  strategies  of  war  ; 
and  this  by  its  use  in  place  of  gunpowder;  wherefore  the 
new  substance  was  termed  "  Gun-cotton." 

The  merit  of  the  invention  is  believed  to  be  due  to 
Professor  Schonbein,  of  Basle.  In  1840,  the  novelty 
was  first  announced  as  an  explosive  compound,  possess- 
ing many  apparent  advantages  over  gunpowder.  It  was 
described  as  a  cotton  prepared  by  a  secret  process ; 


36        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

winch,  on  the  application  of  a  spark,  became  at  once 
converted  into  a  gaseous  state.  In  an  experiment  per- 
formed in  the  laboratory  of  Professor  Schonbein,  a 
certain  weight  of  gunpowder,  when  fired,  filled  the 
apartment  with  smoke  ;  whilst  an  equal  weight  of  gun- 
cotton  exploded  without  producing  any  smoke,  leav- 
ing only  a  few  atoms  of  carbonaceous  matter  behind. 
Cannon-balls  and  shells  were  then  experimentally  pro- 
jected by  this  prepared  cotton,  with  nearly  double  the 
projectile  force  of  gunpowder. 

Professor  Schonbein  made  an  interesting  experiment 
upon  the  wall  of  an  old  castle  :  it  had  been  calculated 
that  from  three  to  four  pounds  of  gunpowder  would 
be  requisite  to  destroy  this  wall,  and  a  hole  capable 
of  containing  that  quantity  was  prepared.  In  this 
aperture  were  put  four  ounces  of  the  prepared 
cotton,  which,  when  fired,  blew  the  massive  wall  to 
pieces. 

Again,  the  sixteenth  part  of  an  ounce  of  the  prepared 
cotton,  placed  in  a  gun,  carried  a  ball  with  such  force, 
that  it  perforated  two  planks  at  the  distance  of  twenty- 
eight  paces;  and,  at  another  time,  with  the  same 
charge,  drove  a  bullet  into  a  wall,  to  the  depth  of  three 
inches  and  three-quarters. 

Professor  Schonbein  attended  the  meeting  of  the 
British  Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science, 
held  at  Southampton,  in  1846,  when  the  operation  of 
this  new  power  was  explained  and  experimented  with. 
Subsequently,  the  professor  attended  at  Osborne 
House,  to  exhibit  the  properties  of  his  gun-cotton  to 
I'rince  Albert,  when  Schonbein  offered  to  explode  a 


BUCKINGHAM  PALACE  GATES.        37 

portion  on  the  hand  of  Colonel  B :  who  would, 

however,  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  novel  power. 
Prince  Albert  himself  submitted  to  the  test,  and  off 
went  the  cotton,  without  smoke,  stain,  or  burning  of 
the  skin.  Thus  encouraged,  the  colonel  took  his  turn  ; 
but  whether  the  material  was  changed  or  not  for 
the  coarser  preparation,  it  gave  him  such  a  singeing 
that  he  leaped  up  with  a  cry  of  pain.  A  hearty  laugh 
was  all  the  commiseration  he  received.  After  this, 
Professor  Schonhein  loaded  a  fowling-piece  with  cot- 
ton in  the  place  of  powder,  and  the  prince  fired  both 
ball  and  shot  from  it  with  the  usual  effect,  and  per- 
fect impunity. 

SIR   JOSEPH    BANKS'S    "BALANCE." 

AT  the  death  of  Sir  Joseph  Banks,  there  was  left  at  the 
apartments  of  the  Royal  Society,  at  Somerset  House, 
a  very  delicate  balance,  constructed  by  Ramsden,  the 
property  of  Sir  Joseph.  The  secretaries  accordingly 
wrote  to  his  widow,  requesting  to  know  her  wishes 
respecting  the  instrument.  "  Pay  it  into  Coutts's," 
was  her  ladyship's  reply. 


BUCKINGHAM   PALACE    GATES. 

THE  central  gates  of  the  marble  arch,  facing  Bucking- 
ham Palace,  were  put  up  in  the  summer  of  1837  :  they 
were  designed  and  cast  by  Samuel  Parker,  then  of 
Argyll-place  •  they  are  the  largest  and  most  superb  in 
Europe,  not  excepting  the  gates  of  the  Ducal  Palace 


38        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

at  Venice,  or  of  the  Louvre  at  Paris.  Their  mate- 
rial is  a  beautiful  alloy,  the  base  of  which  is  refined 
copper.  Although  cast,  their  enriched  foliage  and 
scroll-work  bear  the  elaborate  finish  of  the  finest 
chasing:  the  height  of  each  gate  is  twenty-five  feet; 
width,  seventeen  feet,  six  inches ;  extreme  thickness, 
three  inches ;  weight  of  each,  two  tons,  thirteen  cwt. ; 
yet,  they  are  so  beautifully  hung,  that  a  child  nuuht 
open  and  shut  them.  They  now  terminate  at  the 
springing  of  the  arch ;  but  Mr.  Parker  had  cast 
for  the  heading  a  chaste  frieze,  and  a  design  of  the 
royal  arms  in  the  central  circle,  flanked  by  state 
crowns  :  this  portion  was,  however,  irretrievably  muti- 
lated by  the  Government  removing  the  gates  from  the 
foundry  in  a  common  stage-waggon,  without  due  care 
to  prevent  their  breakage ;  yet  the  work  cost,  altoge- 
ther, 3000  guineas ! 

EARTHQUAKES    IN    CHILE. 

MR.  DARWIN,  in  his  very  interesting  Journal  of  a 
Voyage  round  the  World,  relates  that  he  was  one  day 
dining  with  a  gentleman  at  Coquimbo,  when  a  sharp 
earthquake  happened.  He  heard  the  forthcoming 
rumble,  but  from  the  screams  of  the  ladies,  the  running 
of  servants,  and  the  rush  of  several  of  the  gentlemen  to 
the  doorway,  he  could  not  distinguish  the  motion.  Some 
of  the  women  afterwards  were  crying  with  terror,  and 
one  gentleman  said  he  should  not  be  able  to  sleep  all 
night,  or  if  he  did,  it  would  only  be  to  dream  of  falling 
houses.  The  father  of  this  person  had  lately  lost  all 
his  property  at  Talcahuano,  and  he  himself  had  only 


CUVIER  IN  LONDON,  39 

just  escaped  a  falling  roof  at  Valparaiso,  in  1822.  He 
mentioned  a  curious  coincidence  which  then  happened : 
he  was  playing  at  cards,  when  a  German,  one  of  the 
party,  got  up,  and  said  he  would  never  sit  in  a  room 
in  these  countries  with  the  door  shut,  as,  owing  to  his 
having  done  so,  he  had  nearly  lost  his  life  at  Co- 
piapo.  Accordingly,  he  opened  the  door;  and  no 
sooner  had  he  done  this,  than  he  cried  out,  "  Here  it 
comes  again !"  and  the  famous  shock  commenced.  The 
whole  party  escaped.  The  danger  in  an  earthquake  is 
not  from  the  time  lost  in  opening  a  door,  but  from 
the  chance  of  its  becoming  jammed  by  the  movement 
of  the  walls. 

C-UVIER   IN    LONDON. 

WHEN  Cuvier  visited  England,  in  1818,  in  conversing 
with  the  Prince  Regent  on  the  subject  of  our  Natural 
History  Collections,  he  suggested  the  union  of  all  the 
private  collections  in  one  great  national  museum, 
which,  from  the  extent  of  our  coloniul  possessions,  he 
conceived  would  surpass  every  other  collection  in 
Europe. 

During  the  great  naturalist's  stay  in  London,  he 
was  gratified  with  the  sight  of  a  Westminster  election, 
in  which  he  saw  the  practical  working  of  one  of  our 
most  important  political  institutions.  "At this  period,' 
says  his  biographer,  Mrs.  Lee,  "  the  election  for  West- 
minster was  going  forward,  and  he  frequently  dwelt 
upon  the  amusement  he  had  received  from  being  on 
the  hustings  every  day.  These  orgies  of  liberty  were 
then  unknown  in  France;  and  it  was  a  curious  spec- 


40        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

tacle  for  a  man  who  reflected  so  deeply  on  everything 
which  passed  before  him,  to  see  and  hear  our  orators 
crying  out  at  the  top  of  their  voices  to  the  mob,  who 
pelted  them  with  mud,  cabbages,  eggs,  &c.  &c. ;  and  Sir 
Murray  Maxwell,  in  his  splendid  uniform,  and  deco- 
rated with  orders,  flattering  the  crowd  who  resisted 
him,  and  sent  at  his  head  all  the  varieties  of  the  vege- 
table kingdom.  Nothing  ever  effaced  this  impression 
from  Cuvier's  memory,  who  frequently  described  the 
scene  with  great  animation.'1 


THE  FIRST  CUP  OF  TEA  DRUNK  IN  ENGLAND. 

IN  all  probability,  the  first  cup  of  Tea  made  in  Eng- 
land was  drunk  upon  the  site  of  Buckingham  Palace, 
St.  James's  Park  ;  for  the  Earl  of  Arlington  took  the 
first  pound  of  tea  to  England,  having  bought  it  in 
Holland  for  sixty  shillings  5  and  at  this  time  the  Earl 
resided  at  Arlington  House,  which  was  taken  down 
to  make  room  for  Buckingham  House,  since  altered  to 
the  Queen's  Palace. 

BENEFIT  OF  A  WIFE  TO  AN  AUTHOR. 
THE  wife  of  Nathaniel  Bowditch  was  a  woman  of  sin- 
gular sweetness  of  disposition  and  cheerful  piety,  who, 
by  her  entire  sympathy  with  her  husband  in  all  his 
studies  and  pursuits,  lightened  and  cheered  his  labours ; 
and  by  relieving  him  from  all  domestic  cares,  enabled 
him  to  go  on  with  undivided  mind  and  undistracted 
attention,  in  the  execution  of  his  great  work — the 
translation  of  Laplace's  JMccanique  Celeste,  on  which 


BENEFIT  OF  A  WIFE  TO  AN  AUTHOR.  41 

his  fame  as  a  man  of  science  rests.  He  had  been 
heard  to  say  that  he  never  should  have  accomplished 
the  task,  and  published  the  book  in  its  present  ex- 
tended form,  had  he  not  been  stimulated  and  encou- 
raged by  her.  When  the  serious  question  was  undtr 
consideration  as  to  the  expediency  of  Bowditch's  pub- 
lishing it  at  his  own  expense,  at  the  estimated  cost  of 
10,000  dollars,  (which  it  actually  exceeded,)  with  the 
noble  spirit  of  her  sex,  his  wife  conjured  and  urged  him 
to  go  on  and  do  it,  saying  that  she  would  find  the 
mean?,  and  gladly  make  any  sacrifice,  and  submit  to 
any  self-denial  that  might  be  involved  in  it.  In 
grateful  acknowledgment  of  her  sympathy  and  aid,  he 
proposed,  in  the  concluding  volume,  to  dedicate  the 
work  to  her  memory,  (she  died  in  1834) — a  design  than 
which  nothing  could  be  more  beautiful  or  touching.* 

In  the  course  of  his  labour,  Dr.  Bowditch  used  to 
say,  "I  never  come  across  one  of  Laplace's  Thus  it 
plainly  appears,  without  feeling  sure  that  I  have  got 
hours  of  hard  study  before  me  to  fill  up  the  chasm, 
and  find  out  and  show  how  it  plainly  appears." 

*  It  is  highly  honourable  to  the  sex,  that  the  only  exposition  of 
Laplace's  work  that  has  (1848)  appeared  in  England,  is  from  the 
pen  of  a  female — the  accomplished  Mary  Somerville,  wife  of  Dr. 
Somerville,  of  Chelsea  Hospital.  This  was  published  under  the 
title  of  the  Mechanism  of  the  Heavens,  of  which,  it  is  obserred,  in 
the  Edinburgh  Review,  "  this,  unquestionably,  is  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  works  that  female  intellect  ever  produced  in  any 
age  or  country;  and  with  respect  to  the  present  day,  we  hazard 
little  in  saying  that  Mrs.  Somerville  is  the  only  individual  of 
Her  sex  in  the  world  who  could  have  written  it."  For  this 
signal  service  to  science,  there  was  conferred  upon  the  lady  a  pen- 
sion of  3001.  per  annum,  at  the  recommendation  of  Sir  Robert 
Peel. 


42        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

THE  WORLD  IN  A  DROP  OF  WATER. 
THE  microscope  has  shown  that  a  drop  of  water 
though  it  may  appear  to  the  naked  eye  to  be  perfectly 
clear,  is  swarming  with  living  beings.  According  to 
Ehrenberg,  a  cubic  inch  of  water  may  contain  more 
than  800,000  millions  of  these  beings,  estimating  them 
only  to  occupy  one  fourth  of  its  space  ;  and  a  single 
drop,  placed  under  the  microscope,  will  be  seen  to 
hold  500  millions ;  an  amount,  perhaps,  not  so  very 
far  from  equal  to  the  whole  number  of  human  beings 
on  the  surface  of  our  globe ! 


ORIGIN    OF   POST-PAID    ENVELOPES. 

M.  PIEON  tells  us,  that  the  idea  of  a  Post-paid  En- 
velope originated,  early  in  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV., 
with  M.  de  Velayer,  who,  in  1653,  established,  with 
royal  approbation,  a  private  penny  post,  placing  boxes 
at  the  corners  of  the  streets  for  the  reception  of  letters, 
wrapped  up  in  envelopes,  which  were  to  be  bought  at 
offices  established  for  that  purpose. 

M.  de  Velayer  also  caused  to  be  printed  certain 
forms  of  Mlets,  or  notes  applicable  to  the  ordinary 
business  among  the  inhabitants  of  great  towns,  with 
blanks,  which  were  to  be  filled  up  by  the  pen  with 
such  special  matter  as  might  complete  the  writer's 
object.  One  of  these  billets  has  been  preserved  to  our 
times  by  a  pleasant  misnpplication  of  it.  Pelisson, 
Mde.  de  Sevigne's  friend,  and  the  object  of  the  bojimot, 
that  "  he  abused  the  privilege  which  men  have  of  being 


BRINDLEY,  THE  ENGINEER.  43 

ugly,"  was  amused  at  this  kind  of  skeleton  corres- 
pondence ;  and  under  the  affected  name  of  Pisandre, 
(according  to  the  pedantic  fashion  of  the  day,)  he  filled 
up  and  addressed  one  of  these  forms  to  the  celebrated 
Mademoiselle  de  Scuderi,  in  her pseudonyme  of  Sappho. 
This  strange  billet-doux  has  happened,  from  the  cele- 
brity of  the  parties,  to  be  preserved,  and  is  still  extant : 
one  of  the  oldest,  we  presume,  of  penny-post  letters, 
and  a  curious  example  of  a  pre-paying  envelope — as  well 
as  a  new  proof  of  the  adage,  that  "  there  is  nothing  new 
under  the  sun." 

CHARACTER   IN   WORKS. 

TELFORD,  the  engineer,  relates  that  he  came  to  London 
in  1782,  and  got  employed  at  the  quadrangle  of  Somer- 
set house-buildings  ;  he  soon  became  known  to  Sir  Wil- 
liam Chambers  and  Mr.  R.  Adam,  the  two  most  dis- 
tinguished architects  of  that  day ;  the  former  haughty 
and  reserved,  the  latter  affable  and  communicative ; 
and  a  similar  distinction  of  character  pervades  their 
works,  Sir  William's  being  stiff  and  formal,  and  those  of 
Mr.  Adam,  playful  and  gay. 


BRINDLEY,  THE  ENGINEER. 

THOUGH  one  of  the  most  successful  engineers  of  his 
age,  Brindley  was  so  illiterate  as  to  be  scarcely  able 
to  read  or  to  write.  By  his  unrivalled  powers  of 
abstraction  and  memory,  he  often  executed  his  plans 
without  committing  them  to  paper ;  and  when  he 
was  engaged  in  any  difficult  or  complex  undertaking, 


44         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

he  was  in  the  habit  of  retiring  to  bed,  where  he  often 
remained  for  two  or  three  days,  till  he  had  thoroughly 
completed  his  design.  So  singular,  indeed,  was  the 
structure  of  his  mind,  that  the  spectacle  of  a  play  in 
London,  disturbed  to  such  a  degree  the  balance  of  its 
mechanism,  that  he  could  not,  for  some  time,  resume 
his  usual  pursuits. 

EEASON  FOR  SILENCE. 

SOME  one  asked  Fontaine,  the  celebrated  geometrician, 
what  he  did  in  society  where  he  remained  almost  per- 
fectly silent.  "  I  study,"  replied  he,  "  the  vanity  of 
men,  in  order  to  mortify  it  occasionally." 


ASCENT    OF   THE    JUNGFKAU    ALP. 
IN  1841,  Professor  Forbes,  along  with  M.  Agassiz, 
and  others,  made   a  successful   ascent   of  the  great 
Swiss   mountain,   the    Jungfrau,    whose    summit    is 
13,720  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea. 

Of  six  travellers  and  seven  guides  who  formed  the 
partj',  four  of  each  reached  the  top — viz.,  of  the  former, 
MM.  Forbes,  Agassiz,  Desor,  and  Duchatelies ;  of 
the  latter,  Jacob  Leutvold  (who  ascended  the  Finster 
Aarhorn,)  Johan  Jannon,  Melchior,  Baucholzer,  and 
Andreas  Aplanalp.  They  left  the  Grimsel  on  the 
morning  of  the  27th  of  August,  1841,  ascended  the 
whole  height  of  the  Ober-Aar  Glacier,  and  descended 
the  greater  part  of  that  of  Viesch.  Crossing  a  col  to 
the  right,  they  slept  at  the  chalet  of  Aletsch,  near  the 
lake  of  that  name.  This  was  twelve  hours'  Lard  walk- 


ASCENT  OF  THE  JUNGFRAU  ALP.     45 

ing,  the  descent  of  the  glaciers  being  difficult  and 
fatiguing.  Next  day,  the  party  started  at  six  a.m., 
having  been  unable  sooner  to  procure  a  ladder,  to  cross 
the  crevices  ;  they  then  traversed  the  upper  part  of  the 
glacier  of  Aletsch  in  its  whole  extent  for  four  hours 
and  a  half,  until  the  ascent  of  the  Jungfrau  began. 

The  party  crossed  with  great  caution  extensive  and 
steep  fields  of  fresh  snow,  concealing  crevices,  till  they 
came  to  one  which  opened  vertically,  and  behind  which 
rose  an  excessively  steep  wall  of  hardened  snow. 
Having  crossed  the  crevices  with  the  ladder,  they  as- 
cended the  snow  without  much  danger,  owing  to  its 
consistency.  After  some  similar  walking  they  gained 
the  col,  which  separates  the  Aletsch  Glacier  from  the 
Rothal,  on  the  side  of  Lauterbrunnen,  by  which  the 
ascent  has  usually  been  attempted.  Thus,  the  tra- 
vellers, although  now  at  a  height  of  between  12,000 
and  13,000  feet,  had  by  far  the  hardest  and  most 
perilous  part  of  the  ascent  to  accomplish.  The  whole 
upper  part  of  the  mountain  presented  a  steep,  inclined 
surface  of  what  at  first  seemed  snow,  but  which  soon 
appeared  to  be  hard  ice.  This  slope  was  not  less  than 
800  or  900  feet  in  perpendicular  height,  and  its  sur- 
face (which  Professor  Forbes  measured  several  times 
with  a  clinometer,)  in  many  places  rose  at  45  degrees, 
and  in  few  much  less  ;  and  all  Alpine  travellers  know 
well  what  an  inclined  surface  of  45  degrees  is  to  walk 
up.  Of  course,  every  step  taken  was  cut  with  the 
hatchet,  whilst  the  slope  terminated  below,  on  both  sides 
in  precipices  some  thousand  feet  high.  After  very 
severe  exertion,  they  reached  the  top  of  this  great 


46         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

mountain,  at  four  p.  m.  The  summit  was  so  small  that 
but  one  person  could  stand  upon  it  at  once,  and  that 
not  until  the  snow  had  been  flattened.  The  party  re- 
turned as  they  came  up,  step  by  step,  and  backwards, 
and  arrived  at  the  chalets  of  Aletsch,  and  by  beautiful 
moonlight,  at  half-past  eleven  at  night. 


THE    STEAM-GUN    IN    THE    FIFTEENTH 

CENTURY. 

IN  1841,  M.  Delectuze  discovered,  among  the  manu- 
scripts of  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  an  entry  carrying  a 
knowledge  of  the  steam-engine,  applied  to  warfare,  to 
at  least  as  far  back  as  the  fifteenth  century.  He  has 
published  in  the  Artiste,  a  notice  of  the  life  of  Leo- 
nardo, to  which  he  adds  a  fac -simile  of  a  page  of  one 
of  his  manuscripts,  containing  five  pen-and-ink  sketches 
of  details  of  the  apparatus  of  a  Steam  Gun,  with  an  ex- 
planatory note  on  what  he  designates  the  "  Architon- 
nere."  The  entry  is  as  follows  : — 

Invention  of  Archimedes.  The  architonnere  is  a  machine  of 
fine  copper,  which  throws  balls  with  a  loud  report  and  great 
force.  It  is  used  in  the  following  manner: — One-third  of  the 
instrument  contains  a  large  quantity  of  charcoal  fire.  When 
the  water  is  well  heated,  a  screw  at  the  top  of  the  vessel  which 
contains  the  water  must  be  made  quite  tight.  On  closing  the 
screw  above,  all  the  water  will  escape  below,  will  descend  into 
the  heated  portion  of  the  instrument,  and  be  immediately  con- 
verted into  a  vapour  so  abundant  and  powerful,  that  it  is 
wonderful  to  see  its  force,  and  hear  the  noise  it  produces.  This 
machine  will  carry  a  ball  a  talent  in  weight." 

It  is  worthy  of  remark  that  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  far 
from  claiming  the  merit  of  this  invention  for  himself 
or  the  men  of  his  time,  attributes  it  to  Archimedes. 


ANCIENT  OBSERVATORY  IN  PERSIA.  47 

The  Steam  Gun  of  our  time  has  been  an  exhibition- 
room  wonder ;  and  the  prediction  of  the  Duke  of 
Wellington  that  it  would  fail  in  warfare,  has  never 
been,  and  is  never  likely  to  be,  tested. 


ANCIENT    OBSERVATORY   IN    PERSIA. 

WHEN  Sir  John  Malcolm  visited  Maraga,  he  traced 
distinctly  the  foundations  of  the  Observatory,  con- 
structed in  the  13th  century,  for  N"aser-ood-Deen,  the 
favourite  philosopher  of  the  Tartar  prince,  Hoolakoo, 
the  grandson  of  Ghenghiz,  who,  in  this  locality  relaxed 
from  his  warlike  toils,  and  assembled  round  him  men 
of  the  first  genius  of  the  age,  who  have  commemorated 
his  love  of  science,  and  given  him  more  fame  as  its 
munificent  patron,  than  he  acquired  by  all  his  con- 
quests. 

In  this  observatory  there  was,  according  to  one  of 
the  best  Mahomedan  works,  a  species  of  apparatus  to 
represent  the  celestial  sphere,  with  the  signs  of  the 
zodiac,  the  conjunctions,  transits,  and  revolutions  of 
the  heavenly  bodies.  Through  a  perforation  in  the 
dome,  the  rays  of  the  sun  were  admitted,  so  as  to 
strike  upon  certain  lines  on  the  pavement  in  a  way  to 
indicate,  in  degrees  and  minutes,  the  altitude  and  de- 
clination of  that  luminary  during  every  season,  and  to 
mark  the  time  and  hour  of  the  day  throughout  the 
year.  The  Observatory  was  further  supplied  with 
a  map  of  the  terrestrial  globe,  in  all  its  climates  or 
zones,  exhibiting  the  several  regions  of  the  habitable 
world,  as  well  as  a  general  outline  of  the  ocean,  with 


48        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

the  numerous  islands  contained  in  its  bosom  ;  and,  ac- 
cording to  the  Mahomedan  author,  all  these  were  so 
perspicuously  arranged  and  delineated,  as  at  once  to 
remove,  by  the  clearest  demonstration,  every  doubt 
from  the  mind  of  the  student. 


LONDON   AS   A  PORT. 

SIR  JOHN  HERSCHEL,  who  possesses  in  an  eminent 
degree,  the  peculiar  talent  of  felicitously  illustrating 
every  subject  that  he  approaches,  in  his  valuable  Trea- 
tise on  Astronomy,  thus  refers  to  the  situation  of  Lon 
don  as  a  Port : — "It  is  a  fact,  not  a  little  interesting 
to  Englishmen,  and  combined  with  our  insular  station 
in  that  highway  of  nations,  the  Atlantic,  not  a  little 
explanatory  of  our  commercial  eminence,  that  LONDON 
occupies  nearly  the  centre  of  the  terrestrial  hemisphere." 


FOURDRINIER  S  PAPER-MAKING  MACHINERY. 

ON  April  25,  1839,  some  very  interesting  details  of 
Fourdrinier's  Machinery  for  making  Paper  of  endless 
length,  were  elicited  during  a  debate  in  the  House  of 
Commons,  upon  the  presentation  of  a  petition  from 
these  ingenious  manufacturers.  It  appears  that  1000 
yards,  or  any  given  quantity  of  yards,  of  paper  could 
be  continuously  made  by  it.  Many  years  since,  the 
invention  was  patented ;  but,  owing  to  a  mistake  in 
the  patent — the  word  "machine"  being  written  inste'ad 
of  "  machines " — the  property  was  pirated,  and  that 
led  to  litigations,  in  which  the  patentees'  funds  were 


PAPER-MAKING  MACHINERY.         49 

exhausted  before  they  could  establish  their  rights. 
They  then  became  bankrupts,  and  thus  all  the  fruits  of 
their  invention,  on  which  they  had  spent  40,000?., 
were  entirely  lost  to  them. 

The  evidence  of  Mr.  Brunei,  and  of  Mr.  Lawson, 
the  printer  of  The  Times,  proved  the  invention  of  the 
Fourdriniers  to  be  one  of  the  most  splendid  disco- 
veries of  the  age."  Mr.  Lawson  stated  that  the  con- 
ductors of  the  metropolitan  newspapers  could  never 
have  presented  to  the  world  such  an  immense  mass  of 
news  and  advertisements  as  was  now  contained  in 
them,  had  not  this  invention  enabled  them  to  make 
use  of  any  size  required.  By  the  revolution  of  the 
great  cylinder  employed  in  the  process,  an  extraor- 
dinary degree  both  of  rapidity  and  convenience  in  the 
production  is  secured.  One  of  its  chief  advantages  is 
the  prevention  of  all  risk  of  combination  among  the 
workmen,  the  machine  being  so  easily  managed  that 
the  least  skilful  person  can  attend  to  it.  It  was  added 
that  the  invention  had  caused  a  remarkable  increase 
in  the  revenue:  in  the  year  1800,  when  this  machine 
was  not  in  existence,  the  amount  of  the  paper  duty 
was  195,641/. ;  in  1821,  when  the  machinery  was  in 
full  operation,  the  amount  of  duty  was  579,867?. ;  in 
1835,  it  was  833,822?.  No  doubt,  part  of  this  in- 
crease must  be  set  down  to  other  causes ;  still,  it  was 
impossible  but  for  this  discovery,  that  such  a  quantity 
of  paper  could  have  been  made  and  consumed.  The 
positive  saving  to  the  country  effected  by  it,  had  not 
been  less  than  8,000,000?.  ;  the  increase  in  the  re- 
venue not  less  than  500,000?.  a-year."  At  length,  in 
D 


50         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

May,  1840,  the  sura  of  7,00(M.  was  voted  by  Parlia« 
ment  to  Messrs.  Fourdrinier,  as  some  compensation 
for  their  loss  by  the  defective  state  of  the  patent 
law. 

There  has  been  made  by  this  machinery  at  Colinton 
mills,  a  single  sheet  of  paper  weighing  533  Ibs.,  and 
measuring  upwards  of  a  mile  and  a  half  in  length,  the 
breadth  being  only  50  inches.  Were  a  ream  of  paper 
of  similar  sheets  made,  it  would  weigh  266,500lbs.  or 
upwards  of  123  tons. 

THE    COCOA-NUT    CRAB. 

M.  DAEWIN  in  his  Voyage  round  the  World,  thus 
describes  a  Crab  which  lives  upon  Cocoa-nuts,  and 
which  he  found  on  Keeling  Island,  in  the  South  Seas : 
"  It  is  very  common  on  all  parts  of  the  dry  land,  and 
grows  to  a  monstrous  size  ;  it  has  a  front  pair  of  legs, 
terminated  by  very  strong  and  heavy  pincers,  and  the 
least  pair  by  others  which  are  narrow  and  weak.  It 
would  at  first  be  thought  quite  impossible  for  a  crab 
to  open  a  strong  cocoa-nut  covered  with  the  husk ; 
but  M.  Liesk  assures  me  he  has  repeatedly  seen  the 
operation  effected.  The  crab  begins  by  tearing  the 
husk,  fibre  by  fibre,  and  always  from  that  end  under 
which  the  three  eye-holes  are  situated ;  when  this  is 
completed,  the  crab  commences  hammering  with  its 
heavy  claws  on  one  of  these  eye-holes  till  an  opening 
is  made.  Then,  turning  round  its  body,  by  the  aid  of 
its  posterior  and  narrow  pair  of  pincers,  it  extracts  the 
white  albuminous  substance.  I  think  this  is  as 
curious  a  case  of  instinct  as  ever  I  heard  of,  and  like- 


ASTRONOMICAL  SHOEMAKER.         51 

wise  of  adaptation  in  structure  between  two  objects 
apparently  so  remote  from  each  other  in  the  scheme  of 
nature,  as  a  crab  and  a  cocoa-nut." 


DESCARTES'  WOODEN  DAUGHTER. 

WHEN  Descartes  resided  in  Holland,  he  made  with 
great  labour  and  industry  a  female  automaton,  which 
gave  some  wicked  wits  occasion  to  report  that  he  had 
an  illegitimate  daughter,  named  Franchine.  The 
object  of  Descartes  was,  to  demonstrate  that  beasts 
have  no  souls,  and  are  but  machines  nicely  composed, 
that  move  whenever  another  body  strikes  them  and 
communicates  to  them  a  portion  of  its  motions. 
Having  carried  this  singular  machine  on  board  of  a 
Dutch  vessel,  the  captain,  who  sometimes  heard  it 
move,  had  the  curiosity  to  open  the  box.  Astonished 
to  see  a  little  human  form  uncommonly  animated,  yet 
when  touched  appearing  to  be  nothing  but  wood — and 
being  little  versed  in  science,  but  very  superstitious — 
he  took  the  ingenious  labour  of  the  philosopher  for  a 
little  devil,  and  terminated  the  experiment  of  Des- 
cartes, by  throwing  his  "  wooden  daughter"  into  the 
sea. 

ASTRONOMICAL  SHOEMAKER. 
WHEN  Halley's  comet  was  expected  in  1835,  a  shoe- 
maker of  Leicester,  named  Joseph  Mills,  set  about 
tracing  the  path  of  the  heavenly  visitor  through  the 
heavens.  This  he  did  by  drawing  its  orbit  upon  his 
house  floor,  from  which  he  made  a  diagram  that  more 


52         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

accurately  represented  the  course  of  the  comet  than 
any  that  had  been  previously  published.  On  being 
questioned  how  he  had  calculated  the  disturbing  forces, 
so  as  to  come  so  near  the  truth ;  he  replied  that  he 
could  not  tell,  further  than  he  had  performed  it  by 
the  common  rules  of  arithmetic. 


DECLINE    OF    SCIENCE. 

IN  January,  1842,  a  poor  fellow  was  taken  before  the 
authorities  of  Paris  for  begging  in  the  streets.  He 
had  studied  the  science  of  cookery  under  the  celebrated 
Careme,  and  was  the  inventor  of  the  delicious  Saumon 
truffe  a  la  troche.  He  was  in  the  last  garb  of  want, 
and  attributed  his  poverty  to  the  decline  of  cookery 
from  a  science  to  a  low  art !  It  has  been  observed 
that  cooks,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  after  ministering 
to  the  luxury  of  the  opulent,  creep  into  holes  and 
corners,  and  pass  neglected  out  of  the  world. 


VARIABLE  CLIMATE  OF  TEBREEZ. 
TEBREEZ  is  celebrated  as  one  of  the  most  healthy 
cities  in  Persia,  and  it  is  on  this  ground  alone  that  we 
can  account  for  its  being  so  often  rebuilt  after  its  re- 
peated demolition  by  earthquakes.  It  is  seldom  free 
even  for  a  twelvemonth  from  slight  shocks ;  and  it  is 
not  yet  so  much  as  a  century  since  it  was  levelled  to 
the  ground  by  one  of  those  terrible  convulsions  of 
nature. 

Sir  John  Malcolm,  when  he  visited  this  place,  was 
more  surprised  at  its  salubrity,  from  knowing  the 
great  extremes  of  heat  and  cold  to  which  it  is  subject ; 


VARIABLE  CLIMATE  OF  TEBREEZ.     53 

having  obtained  from  a  friend  who  had  resided  there 
during  the  whole  of  the  preceding  year,  a  most  accu- 
rate diary  of  the  various  changes  of  its  climate. 

"  From  this,  it  appeared  that  on  the  20th  of  October  there 
was  a  heavy  fall  of  snow,  which  did  not,  however,  remain  long 
upon  the  ground  :  the  weather  again  became  mild,  and  there 
•was  no  excessive  cold  until  the  middle  of  December,  from  which 
period,  until  the  end  of  January,  Fahrenheit's  thermometer, 
when  exposed  to  the  air  at  night,  never  rose  above  zero ;  and 
iu  the  house  at  mid-day  it  was  seldom  above  18°. 

"January  was  by  far  the  coldest  month.  During  it,  the 
water  is  described  as  becoming  almost  instantaneously  solid  in 
the  tumblers  upon  the  dining-table,  and  the  ink  often  freezing 
in  the  ink-stand,  although  the  table  was  close  to  the  fire.  For 
at  least  a  fortnight,  not  an  egg  was  to  be  had,  all  being  split  by 
the  cold.  Some  bottles  of  wine  froze,  although  covered  with 
straw,  and  many  of  the  copper  ewers  were  split  by  the  expan- 
sion of  the  water  when  frozen  in  them. 

"  According  to  tliis  diary,  the  weather  became  comparatively 
mild  towards  the  end  of  February ;  but  it  appears  that  here,  as 
in  England, 

'  A  lingering  winter  chills  the  lap  of  May ;' 
for,  on  the  first  of  that  month,  there  was  a  heavy  fall  of  snow, 
with  such  cold  that  all  promise  of  the  spring  was  destroyed. 
Of  the  heat  that  ensued,  and  the  sudden  and  great  changes  to 
which  Tebreez  is  subject,  we  had  abundant  proof;  in  the  month 
of  June,  the  range  of  the  thermometer  being  usually,  within 
the  twenty-four  hours,  from  56°  to  94°, — a  difference  of  38°. 

"  The  extreme  heat  of  the  summer  causes  most  of  the  houses 
in  Tabreez  to  be  built  so  as  to  admit  the  air  during  that  season; 
but  the  architects  of  Persia  fall  short  of  their  brethren  in 
Europe,  in  forming  places  by  which  the  cool  air  can  be  admitted 
in  summer,  and  excluded  in  winter.  This  partly  accounts  for 
the  above  effects  of  cold ;  but  the  city  of  Tebreez,  and  many 
more  parts  of  Aderbejan,  and  still  more  of  the  neighbouring 
province  of  Kurdistan,  though  nowhere  beyond  the  40th  degree 
of  latitude,  are,  from  their  great  elevation,  subject  to  extreme 
cold.  In  the  latter  country  (says  Sir  John  Malcolm)  I  found, 
on  the  morning  of  the  17th  of  August,  ice  half  an  inch  thick  on 
•  basin  of  water  standing  in  my  tent."* 

*  Sketches  of  Persia. 


54          INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

STRYCHNINE  A  REMEDY  FOR  PARALYSIS. 

STRYCHNINE  (obtained  in  the  greatest  purity  from  the 
Upas  Tiente)  has  been  used  successfully  for  this 
purpose.  One  of  Dr.  Bardesley's  patients  in  Lincoln- 
shire, who  was  experiencing  the  return  of  sensation 
in  his  paralyzed  limbs,  under  the  use  of  strychnine, 
asked  if  there  was  not  something  quick  in  the  pills ; 
quick  for  alive  being  still  in  use  in  that  part  of  Eng- 
land.   

RAPID    MANUFACTURE. 

MANY  years  ago,  the  late  Sir  John  Throckmorton  sat 
down  to  dinner,  dressed  in  a  coat  which,  the  same 
morning,  had  been  wool  on  the  back  of  the  sheep.  The 
animals  were  sheared  ;  the  wool  washed,  carded,  spun, 
and  woven ;  the  cloth  was  scoured,  fulled,  sheared, 
dyed,  and  dressed ;  and  then,  by  the  tailor's  aid,  made 
into  a  coat,  between  sunrise  and  the  hour  of  seven, 
when  a  party  sat  down  to  dinner,  with  Sir  John,  as 
their  chairman,  wearing  the  product  of  the  active  day ! 


DISCOVERIES    ANTICIPATED. 

FROM  time  immemorial,  the  inhabitants  of  some  dis- 
tant regions  have  carried  on  their  nocturnal  or  under- 
ground manufactures  by  natural  gas,  obtained  through 
a  hollow  reed  thrust  into  the  earth.  Arriving  at 
modern  times,  navigation  by  the  Archimedes  screw,  as 
a  propeller,  through  the  means  of  steam,  attracted  the 
notice  of  the  Scottish  Society  of  Arts  in  1840;  but, 


NICE  ROBBERY.  55 

above  twenty  years  previously,  an  experiment  with 
similar  screws,  adapted  to  a  boat,  on  the  lake  Lcchend, 
by  Mr.  Whytock,  a  member  of  the  Society,  proved  the 
efficiency  of  the  invention,  though  on  a  small  scale. 
In  Scotland,  an  Agricultural  Society  was  established 
in  1723  ;  a  thrashing-machine  appeared  in  1735  ;  and 
A  reaping-machine  in  1765. 


THE  FIKST  USE  OF  JESUIT'S  BARK. 
A  CASUAL  circumstance,  it  is  said,  discovered  that 
excellent  febrifuge,  the  Jesuit's  Bark.  An  Indian  in 
a  delirious  fever  was  left  by  his  companions,  as  incur- 
able, by  the  side  of  a  river,  to  quench  his  burning  thirst 
while  dying.  He  naturally  drank  copious  draughts  of 
the  water,  which,  having  long  imbibed  the  virtues  of 
the  bark,  that  floated  abundantly  on  the  stream, 
quickly  dispersed  the  fever  of  the  Indian.  He  re- 
turned to  his  friends,  and  explained  the  nature  of  his 
remedy  ;  and  the  sick  crowded  about  the  margin  of 
the  holy  stream  (as  they  imagined  it)  till  they  had 
quite  exhausted  its  virtues.  The  sages  of  the  tribe 
found  out  at  length,  however,  whence  the  efficacy  of 
the  stream  arose.  The  Indians  discovered  it  first,  in 
]  640,  to  the  lady  of  a  Viceroy  of  Peru,  who  by  its  use 
recovered  of  a  dangerous  fever ;  and  in  1643  it  was 
known  at  Rome. 

NICE    KOBBERY. 

M.  BACHALTER,  a  French  florist,  kept  some  beautiful 
species  of  the  anemone  to  himself,  which  he  had  pro- 


56         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

cured  from  the  East  Indies;  and  he  succeeded  in  with- 
holding them,  for  ten  years,  from  all  who  wished  to 
possess  them  likewise.  A  counsellor  of  the  parliament, 
however,  one  day  paid  him  a  visit,  while  the  anemones 
were  in  seed,  and  in  walking  with  him  round  the  gar- 
den contrived  to  let  his  gown  fall  upon  them.  By  this 
means  he  swept  off  a  good  number  of  the  seeds  ;  and 
his  servant,  who  had  been  apprised  of  the  scheme, 
dexterously  wrapt  up  the  gown  and  secured  them. 
Any  one  must  have  been  a  sour  moralist  who  should 
have  considered  this  to  be  a  breach  of  the  eighth  com- 
mandment. 


FEMALE    MATHEMATICIAN. 

IN  the  year  1736,  the  French  Academy  of  Sciences 
proposed,  as  a  subject  for  a  prize,  "  the  Propagation  of 
Heat,"  when  the  Marchioness  of  Chatelet  entered  the 
list  of  competitors.  Her  work  was  not  only  an  ele- 
gant account  of  all  the  properties  of  heat  at  that  time 
known  to  natural  philosophers,  but  it  was  also  remark- 
able for  various  proposals  for  experiments ;  one,  among 
others,  which  was  afterwards  followed  up  by  Herschel, 
and  from  which  he  derived  one  of  the  chief  gems  in 
his  brilliant  scientific  crown. 


FOURIER  S    INDEPENDENCE. 

IT  was  only  occasionally  that  the  real  character  of 
Fourier,  the  French  philosopher,  showed  itself.  "  It 
is  strange,"  said,  one  day,  a  certain  very  influential 


MECHANICAL  TRIUMPHS.  57 

person  belonging  to  the  court  of  Charles  X.,  whom 
the  servant,  Joseph,  would  not  allow  to  get  further 
than  Fourier's  ante-chamber — "it  is  really  strange 
that  your  master  should  be  more  difficult  of  access 
than  a  minister."  Fourier,  overhearing  this  remark, 
jumped  out  of  bed,  to  which  he  had  been  confined  by 
indisposition,  opened  the  room  door,  and  facing  the 
courtier,  exclaimed,  "  Joseph,  tell  the  gentleman,  that 
if  I  were  a  minister,  I  should  receive  everybody,  be- 
cause such  would  be  my  duty :  as  a  private  individual, 
I  receive  whom  I  think  fit,  and  when  I  think  fit." 
The  grandee,  disconcerted  by  the  liveliness  of  the  sally, 
did  not  answer  a  word.  We  must  even  suppose  that 
from  that  instant  he  determined  to  visit  nobody  but 
ministers,  for  the  simple  savant  heard  no  more  of  him. 


MECHANICAL   TEIUMPHS. 

THE  direct  and  almost  instant  benefits  of  Mechanical 
Inventions  to  their  originators  have  been  thus  elo- 
quently illustrated  in  the  Edinburgh  Review  : — "  Con- 
tributing, as  they  do,  to  our  most  immediate  and 
pressing  wants — appealing  to  the  eye  by  their  magni- 
tude, and  often  by  their  grandeur,  and  associated,  in 
many  cases,  with  the  warmer  impulses  of  humanity 
and  personal  safety — the  labours  of  the  mechanist  and 
engineer  acquire  a  contemporary  celebrity,  which  is 
not  vouchsafed  to  the  results  of  scientific  research,  or 
to  the  productions  of  literature  and  the  fine  arts.  The 
gigantic  steam-vessel,  which  expedites  and  facilitates 
the  intercourse  of  nations — the  canal,  which  unites  two 


58        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

distant  seas — the  bridge  and  the  aqueduct,  which  span 
an  impassable  valley — the  harbour  and  the  break- 
water, which  shelter  our  vessels  of  peace  and  of  war — 
the  railway,  which  hurries  us  along  on  the  wings  of 
mechanism,  and  the  light  beacon  which  throws  its 
directing  beams  over  the  deep — address  themselves  to 
the  secular  interests  of  every  individual,  and  obtain 
for  the  engineer  who  invented  or  who  planned  them, 
a  high  and  a  well-merited  popular  reputation." 


THE    ELGIN    MARBLES. 

THESE  beautiful  relics  of  Grecian  antiquity  cost  the 
Earl  of  Elgin  74,000£M  of  which  sum  he  barely  re- 
ceived one  -  half  from  Government ;  so  that  Lord 
Byron's  imputation  to  the  Earl  of  a  mercantile  spirit 
in  the  transaction  is  notoriously  unjust. 


EALEIGH   A   CHEMIST. 

DURING  his  confinement  in  the  Tower  of  London,  Sir 
Walter  Raleigh  devoted  a  considerable  portion  of  his 
time  to  chemical  and  pharmaceutical  investigations ; 
and  interesting  it  is  to  see  how  his  unsubdued  spirit 
enabled  him  to  make  the  most  of  his  misfortunes,  to 
surmount  difficulties,  and  to  turn  ordinary  things  to 
extraordinary  purposes, — greatly,  no  doubt,  to  the 
amazement  of  those  about  him,  who  marvelled  much 
to  behold  the  splendid  courtier,  and  the  captain  of  a 
happier  day,  earnestly  employing  himself  with  che- 
mical stills  and  crucibles  in  a  vacant  hen-house !  "  He 


POWER  OF  THE  LEVER.  59 

has  converted,"  says  Sir  W.  Wade,  the  lieutenant  of 
the  Tower,  in  a  letter  to  Cecil,  "  a  little  hen-house  in 
the  garden  into  a  still-house,  and  here  he  doth  spend 
his  time  all  day  in  distillations." 


MR.  BABBAGE'S  CALCULATING  MACHINE. 

A  CALCULATING  machine  is  a  fair  subject  for  a  joke. 
In  May,  1839,  when  an  additional  grant  was  applied 
for  in  the  House  of  Commons,  in  order  to  complete 
Mr.  Babbage's  machine,  Mr.  Wakley  inquired  whether 
it  was  likely  to  be  of  any  use  to  the  public  ?  Upon 
this,  Sir  Robert  Peel  felicitously  replied,  that  "  the 
machine  should  be  put  to  calculate  the  time  at  which 
it  would  be  of  any  use."  The  calculating  machine 
has  certainly  not  yet  been  put  to  any  more  practical 
purpose. 

HERSCHEL'S  LOVE  or  MUSIC. 

SIB  WILLIAM  HEHSCHEL  was  a  good  musician,  yet 
such  was  his  ardour  for  astronomical  discovery,  that  at 
some  benefit  concert  which  he  gave,  he  had  his  tele- 
scope fixed  in  a  window,  and  made  his  observations 
between  the  acts. 

POWER    OF    THE    LEVER. 

ARCHIMEDES  said,  "  Give  me  a  lever  long  enough,  and 
a  prop  strong  enough,  and  with  my  own  weight  I  will 
move  the  world."  "  But,"  says  Dr.  Arnott,  "  he  would 
have  required  to  move  with  the  velocity  of  a  cannon- 
ball  for  millions  of.  years,  to  alter  the  position  of  the 


GO         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

earth  a  small  part  of  an  inch.  This  feat  of  Archimedes 
is,  in  mathematical  truth,  performed  by  every  man 
who  leaps  from  the  ground ;  for  he  kicks  the  world 
away  from  him  whenever  he  rises,  and  attracts  it  again 
when  he  falls."  

AN    ELECTRIFYING    MACHINE    IN    PERSIA. 

WHEN  Sir  James  Malcolm  was  in  Persia,  on  his  first 
expedition,  an  electrifying  machine  which  he  took  with 
him  was  one  of  the  chief  means  of  astonishing  his 
Persian  friends  ;  and  with  its  effects  he  surprised  and 
alarmed  all,  from  majesty  itself  to  the  lowest  peasant. 

At  Isfahan,  all  were  delighted  with  the  electric  ma- 
chine, except  one  renowned  doctor  and  lecturer  of 
the  college,  who,  envious  of  the  popularity  gained 
by  this  display  of  superior  science,  contended  publicly 
that  the  effects  produced  were  moral,  not  physical ; 
that  it  was  the  mummery  the  Europeans  practised, 
and  the  state  of  the  nervous  agitation  they  excited, 
which  produced  an  ideal  shock ;  but  he  expressed  his 
conviction  that  a  man  of  true  firmness  of  mind  would 
stand  unmoved  by  all  that  could  be  produced  out  of 
the  glass  bottle,  as  he  scoffingly  termed  the  machine. 
He  was  invited  to  the  next  experiment,  the  day  ar- 
rived, and  he  came  accordingly. 

This  doctor  was  called  "  Red-stockings,"  from  his 
usually  wearing  scarlet  hose.  He  was,  notwithstand- 
ing his  learning  and  reputed  science,  often  made  an 
object  of  mirth  in  the  circles  of  the  great  and  wealthy 
at  Isfahan,  to  whom  he  furnished  constant  amusement, 


ELECTRIFYING  MACHINE  IN  PERSIA.  61 

from  the  pertinacity  with  which  he  maintained  his 
dogmas. 

Hence,  "  Red-stockings,"  with  all  his  philosophy, 
was  not  overwise.  Nevertheless,  he  maintained  his 
ground  in  the  first  society,  by  means  common  in  Per- 
sia, as  ir/other  countries :  he  was,  in  fact,  a  little  of  the 
fool,*  and  not  too  much  of  the  honest.  This  impres- 
sion of  his  character,  combined  with  his  presumption, 
made  Sir  John  Malcolm  and  his  party  less  scrupulous 
in  their  preparations  to  render  him  an  example  for  all 
who  might  hereafter  doubt  the  effects  of  their  boasted 
electricity ;  indeed,  their  Persian  visitors  seemed 
anxious  that  the  effect  should  be  such  as  to  satisfy  the 
man  that  had  dared  them  to  the  trial — that  it  was 
physical,  not  moral. 

The  philosopher,  notwithstanding  various  warnings, 
came  boldly  up,  and  took  hold  of  the  chain  with  both 
hands,  planted  his  feet  firmly,  shut  his  teeth,  and  evi- 
dently called  forth  all  his  resolution  to  resist  the  shock. 
It  was  given;  and  poor  "Red-stockings"  dropped  on 
the  floor,  as  if  he  bad  been  shot.  There  was  a  momen- 
tary alarm ;  but,  on  his  almost  instant  recovery,  and 
it  being  explained  that  the  effect  had  been  increased  by 
the  determination  to  resist  it,  all  gave  way  to  one 
burst  of  laughter.  The  good-natured  philosopher  took 
no  offence.  He  muttered  something  about  the  re- 
action of  the  feelings  after  being  overstrained,  but  ad- 
mitted there  was  more  in  the  glass  bottle  than  he  had 
anticipated. 

*  " Poco  di  motto"  is  deemed  by  the  Italians  an  essential 
quality  in  a  great  man's  companion. 


62         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

HOW  TO   MEASURE   THE    SHOCK  OF  AN 

EARTHQUAKE. 

DB.  BUCKIAND  relates  that  in  certain  places  liable  to 
earthquakes,  their  extent  has  been  measured  by  bowls 
of  treacle,  the  inclination  of  the  treacle  in  the  bowl 
showing  the  quantum  of  shock  ;  and  elsewhere  (by  a 
watchmaker)  in  Scotland,  by  placing  a  clock  against 
each  of  the  four  walls  of  an  apartment,  and  marking 
the  centre  of  the  disk  of  the  pendulum  with  chalk  : 
when  the  shock  took  place,  the  derangement  caused 
the  pendulum  to  strike  against  the  back  and  front  01 
the  clock-case,  when,  of  course,  a  mark  would  be  left 
indicative  of  the  phenomenon,  though  not  of  its 
amount. 

THE    DRUMMOND    LIGHT. 

THE  importance  of  simplicity  in  inventions  for  popular 
use,  has  been  shown  in  the  late  Lieutenant  Drum- 
mond's  apparatus  for  illuminating  lighthouses  with 
his  oxyhydrogen  light ;  that  is,  a  stream  of  oxygen 
and  another  of  hydrogen,  directed  upon  a  ball  of  lime. 
Experimentally,  the  light  has  succeeded  beyond  the 
expectation  of  the  inventor ;  but  the  machinery  or 
apparatus  remains  to  be  simplified  before  it  can  be 
worked  by  the  keepers  of  lighthouses. 


ST.  PIERRE'S  "PAUL  AND  VIRGINIA." 

BARON  HUMBOLDT,  in  his  Cosmos,  vol.  ii.,  pays  the 
following  eloquent  tribute  to  that  small  production  of 


ST.  PIERRE'S  "PAUL  AND  VIRGINIA."  63 

the  creative  imagination  to  which  Bernardin  de  St. 
Pierre  owes  the  fairest  portion  of  his  literary  fame — 
Paul  and  Virginia — a  work  such  as  scarcely  any  other 
literature  can  show. 

"  It  is,"  says  Humboldt, "  a  simple,  but  living  picture 
of  an  island  in  the  midst  of  the  tropic  seas,  in  which, 
sometimes  smiled  on  by  serene  and  favouring  skies, 
sometimes  threatened  by  the  violent  conflict  of  the 
elements,  two  young  and  graceful  forms  stand  out 
picturesquely  from  the  wild  luxuriance  of  the  vegeta- 
tion of  the  forest,  as  from  a  flowery  tapestry.  Here 
the  aspect  of  the  sea,  the  grouping  of  the  clouds,  the 
rustling  of  the  breeze  in  the  bushes  of  the  bamboo,  and 
the  waving  of  the  lofty  palmo,  are  painted  with  in- 
imitable truth. 

"Bernardin  de  St.  Pierre's  master- work,  Paul  and 
Virginia,  accompanied  me  into  the  zone  to  which  it 
owes  its  origin.  It  was  there  read  for  many  years  by 
ray  dear  companion  and  friend,  Bonpland,  and  myself; 
and  there  (let  this  appeal  to  personal  feelings  be  for- 
given) under  the  silent  brightness  of  the  tropical 
sky,  or  when,  in  the  rainy  season,  on  the  shores  of 
the  Orinoco,  the  thunder  crashed,  and  the  flashing 
lightnings  illuminated  the  forest,  we  were  deeply  im- 
pressed and  penetrated  with  the  wonderful  truth  with 
which  this  little  work  paints  the  power  of  nature  in 
the  tropical  zone  in  all  its  peculiarity  of  character. 

"  A  similar  firm  grasp  of  special  features,  without 
impairing  the  general  impression,  or  depriving  the  ex- 
ternal materials  of  the  free  and  animating  breath  of 
poetic  imagination,  characterises  in  an  even  higher 


64         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

degree  the  ingenious  and  tender  author  of  "  Atala," 
"  Rene,"  "  the  Martyr,"  and  the  "  Journey  to  Greecft 
and  Palestine."  The  contrasted  landscapes  of  the  most 
varied  portions  of  the  earth's  surface  are  brought  to- 
gether, and  made  to  pass  before  the  mind's  eye  with 
wonderful  distinctness  of  vision  :  the  serious  grandeur 
of  historic  remembrances  could  alone  have  given  so 
much  depth  and  repose  to  the  impressions  of  a  rapid 
journey."  

MYTHOLOGY   OF    SCIENCE. 

M.  ARAGO,  in  his  brilliant  doge  on  Fourier,  observes : 
— "  The  ancients  had  a  taste,  or  rather  a  passion,  for 
the  marvellous,  which  made  them  forget  the  sacred 
ties  of  gratitude.  Look  at  them,  for  instance,  collecting 
into  one  single  group  the  high  deeds  of  a  great  number 
of  heroes,  whose  names  they  have  not  even  deigned  to 
preserve,  and  attributing  them  all  to  Hercules.  The 
lapse  of  centuries  has  not  made  us  wiser.  The  public 
in  our  time  also  delight  in  mingling  fiction  with  his- 
tory. In  all  careers,  particularly  in  that  of  the  sciences, 
there  is  a  design  to  create  Herculeses.  According  to 
the  vulgar  opinion,  every  astronomical  discovery  is 
attributable  to  Herschel.  The  theory  of  the  motions  of 
the  planets  is  identified  with  the  name  of  Laplace,  and 
scarcely  any  credit  is  allowed  to  the  important  labours 
of  D'Alembert,  Clairaut,  Euler,  and  Lagrange.  "Watt 
is  the  sole  inventor  of  the  steam-engine,  whilst  Chaptal 
has  enriched  the  chemical  arts  with  all  those  ingenious 
and  productive  processes  which  secure  their  pros- 
perity." To  countervail  this  error,  Arago  continues ; 


EL  DORADO  OF  SIR  WALTER  RALEIGH.  65 

"  .Let  us  hold  up  to  legitimate  admiration  those  chosen 
men  whom  nature  has  endowed  with  the  valuable 
faculty  of  grouping  together  isolated  facts,  and  de- 
ducing beautiful  theories  from  them ;  but  do  not  let 
us  forget  that  the  sickle  of  the  reaper  must  cut  down 
the  stalks  of  corn,  before  any  one  can  think  of  collect- 
ing them  into  sheaves." 


EL    DORADO    OF   SIR   "WALTER   RALEIGH. 

THE  term  El  Dorado  is  commonly  considered  to  have 
reference  to  the  sovereignty  teeming  with  precious 
metals,  which  had  long  been  sought  for  in  vain  by 
Spanish  adventurers.  Their  expeditions  in  quest  of  it 
were  directed  to  the  interior  of  the  vast  region  lying 
between  the  Orinoco  and  the  Amazon,  or  Guiana. 
The  rocks  were  represented  as  impregnated  with  gold, 
the  veins  of  which  lay  so  near  the  surface  as  to  make 
it  shine  with  a  dazzling  resplendency.  The  capital, 
Manoa,  was  said  to  consist  of  houses  covered  with 
plates  of  gold,  and  to  be  built  upon  a  vast  lake,  named 
Parima,  the  sands  of  which  were  auriferous. 

We  abridge  the  following  new  version  of  this  "  ro- 
mance of  history,"  from  a  brilliant  paper  on  the  life  and 
works  of  Raleigh,  in  the  Edinburgh  Review. 

The  term  El  Dorado  was  not  originally  used  to  designate 
any  particular  place;  it  signified  generally  'the  gilded,"  or 
'  golden,'  and  was  variously  applied.  According  to  some,  it  wag 
first  used  to  denote  a  religious  ceremony  of  the  natives,  in 
covering  the  anointed  body  with  gold-dust.  The  whole  of 
Guiana  was,  on  account  of  the  above  usages,  sometimes  desig- 
nated El  Dorado;  but  the  locality  of  the  fable  varied. 

The  question,  however,  to  be  solved  is,  whence  arose  the  be- 
E 


66        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

lief  that  a  district  so  marvellously  abundant  with  the  precious 
metals  existed  in  the  interior  of  Guiana  ;  and  the  solution  ap- 
pears to  have  been  left  to  Ilumboldt.  While  exploring  the 
countries  upon  the  Upper  Orinoco,  he  was  informed  that  the 
portion  of  Eastern  Guiana,  lying  between  the  rivers  Essequibo 
and  Branca  is '  the  classical  soil  of  the  Dorado  of  Parima.'  Ill 
the  islets  and  rocks  of  mica,  slate,  and  talc,  which  rise  up  with- 
in and  around  a  lake  adjoining  the  Parima  river,  reflecting  from 
their  sliming  surfaces  the  rays  of  an  ardent  sun,  we  have  mate- 
rials out  of  which  to  form  that  gorgeous  capital,  the  temples  and 
houses  of  which  were  overlaid  with  plates  of  beaten  gold. 

With  such  elements  to  work  upon,  heated  fancies,  aided  by 
the  imperfect  vision  of  distant  and  dubious  objects,  might  easily 
create  that  fabulous  superstructure.  We  may  judge  of  the 
brilliancy  of  these  deceptive  appearances,  from  learning  that  the 
natives  ascribed  the  lustre  of  the  Magellanic  clouds,  or  nebula  of 
the  southern  hemisphere,  to  the  bright  reflections  produced  by 
them.  There  could  not  well  be  a  more  poetical  exaggeration 
of  the  lustrous  effects  produced  by  the  metallic  hues  of  rocks  of 
talc.  These  details,  in  which  31.  de  Pens,  a  somewhat  later 
traveller,  who  long  resided  in  an  official  capacity  in  the  neigh- 
bouring countries,  fully  concurs,  in  all  probability  point  to  the 
true  origin  of  this  remarkable  fable.  The  well-known  failure 
of  Raleigh  did  not  discourage  other  adventurers,  who  were  found 
in  quick  succession ;  the  last  always  flattering  themselves  with 
the  hope  that  the  discovery  of  El  Dorado  would  ultimately  be 
realized. 


AMBER,  A  SOURCE  OF  INTERNATIONAL  TRADE. 

THE  amber  trade,  which  was  probably  first  directed 
to  the  west  Cimbrian  coasts,  and  only  subsequently  to 
the  Baltic  and  the  country  of  the  Esthonians,  owes  its 
first  origin  to  the  boldness  and  perseverance  of  Phoe- 
nician coast  navigators.  In  its  subsequent  extension, 
it  offers  a  remarkable  instance  of  the  influence  which 
may  be  exerted  by  a  predilection  for  even  a  single 
foreign  production,  in  opening  an  inland  trade  between 
nations,  and  in  making  known  large  tracts  of  country. 


LIGHTNING  CONDUCTORS.  G7 

In  the  same  way  that  the  Phocaean  Massilians  brought 
the  British  tin  across  France  to  the  Rhone,  the  amber 
was  conveyed  from  people  to  people  through  Germany, 
and  by  the  Celts  on  either  declivity  of  the  Alps  to  the 
Padus,  and  through  Pannonia  to  the  Borysthenes. 
It  was  this  inland  traffic  which  first  brought  the  coasts 
of  the  Northern  ocean  into  connexion  with  the  Euxine 
and  the  Adriatic. — Humboldfs  Cosmos. 


ANTIQUITY   OF   LIGHTNING   CONDUCTORS. 

A  STORY  was  formerly  repeated  in  Germany,  after 
Father  Angelo  Cortenoria,  that  the  tomb  of  the  hero 
of  Clusium,  Lars  Porsena,  described  by  Varro,  orna- 
mented with  a  bronze  head  and  bronze  pendent  chains, 
was  an  apparatus  for  atmospheric  electricity,  or  for 
conducting  lightning  (as  were,  according  to  Michaelis, 
the  metal  points  on  Solomon's  temple) ;  but  the  tale 
obtained  currency  at  a  time  when  men  were  much  in- 
clined to  attribute  to  ancient  nations  the  remains  of  a 
supernaturally  revealed  primitive  knowledge,  which 
was  soon  after  obscured. 

The  most  important  notice  of  the  relation  between 
lightning  and  conducting  metals  (a  fact  not  difficult 
of  discovery)  still  appears  to  be  that  of  Ctesias :  he 
possessed  two  iron  swords,  presents  from  the  King 
Artaxerxes  Mnemon,  and  from  his  mother  Parysatis, 
which,  when  planted  in  the  earth,  averted  clouds,  hail, 
and  strokes  of  lightning.  He  had  himself  seen  the 
operation,  for  the  king  had  twice  made  the  experiment 
before  his  eyes. 


G8         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

The  exact  attention  paid  by  the  Etruscans  to  the 
meteorological  processes  of  the  atmosphere  in  all  that 
deviated  from  the  ordinary  course  of  phenomena,  makes 
it  to  be  lamented  that  nothing  has  come  down  to  us 
from  their  Fulgur  red  books.  The  epochs  of  the 
appearance  of  great  comets,  of  the  fall  of  meteoric 
stones,  and  of  showers  of  falling  stars,  would  no  doubt 
have  been  found  recorded  in  them,  as  in  the  more 
ancient  Chinese  annals,  of  which  Edward  Biot  has 
made  use.  Creuzer  has  attempted  to  show,  that  the 
natural  features  of  Etruria  may  have  influenced  the 
peculiar  turn  of  mind  of  its  inhabitants.  A  "  calling 
forth"  of  the  lightning,  which  is  ascribed  to  Prome- 
theus, reminds  us  of  the  pretended  "  drawing  down" 
of  lightning  by  the  Fulguratores.  This  operation 
consisted  in  a  mere  conjuration,  and  may  well  have 
been  of  no  more  efficacy  than  the  skinned  ass'  head, 
which,  in  the  Etruscan  rites,  was  considered  a  preser- 
vative from  danger  in  their  thunder-storms. — (Set. 
Notes  to  Humboldfs  Cosmos,  vol.  ii.) 


HOW  THE  DEAF  MAY  HEAR. 

ABOUT  1738,  a  merchant  of  Cleves,  named  Jorissen, 
who  had  become  almost  totally  deaf,  sitting  one  day 
near  a  harpsichord,  while  some  one  was  playing — and 
having  a  tobacco-pipe  in  his  mouth,  the  bowl  of  which 
rested  accidentally  against  the  body  of  the  instru- 
ment— was  surprised  to  hear  all  the  notes  most  dis- 
tinctly. By  a  little  reflection  and  practice,  he  again 
attained  the  use  of  this  valuable  sense ;  for  he  soon 


DRYING  WOOD  FOR  VIOLINS.         69 

learned — by  means  of  a  piece  of  hard  wood,  one  end 
of  which  he  placed  against  his  teeth,  while  another 
psrson  placed  the  other  end  on  his  teeth — to  keep  up 
a  conversation,  and  to  be  able  to  understand  the  least 
whisper.  The  effect  thus  described  is  the  same,  if  the 
person  who  speaks  rests  his  stick  against  his  throat  or 
his  breast ;  or  when  one  rests  the  stick  which  he  holds 
in  his  teeth  against  some  vessel  into  which  the  other 
speaks. 


DRYING  WOOD  FOR  VIOLINS. 
SOME  amusing  instances  are  related  of  the  efficiency 
of  "  the  Application  of  Heated  Currents  to  Manufac- 
turing and  other  Purposes,"  once  patented  by  Davi- 
son  and  Symington.  Thus,  a  violin  had  been  in  the 
owner's  possession  for  upwards  of  sixteen  years,  how 
old  it  was  when  he  first  had  it  is  not  known.  Upon 
being  exposed  to  this  process,  it  lost  in  eight  hours  no 
less  than  five -sixths  (nearly  five  and  two-thirds)  per 
cent,  of  its  weight.  This  there  is  every  reason  to 
believe  was  owing  to  the  blocks  glued  inside,  for  the 
purpose  of  holding  the  more  slender  parts  together. 
Instrument  makers  would  do  well  to  see  that  all  parts, 
however  mean  their  position  in  the  instrument,  are 
properly  seasoned,  or  divested  of  moisture ;  for  surely 
water  cannot  improve  sound. 

A  violin-maker  of  high  reputation,  having  an  order 
to  make  an  instrument  for  one  of  the  first  violinists  of 
the  day,  was  requested  to  have  the  wood  seasoned  by 
the  new  process ;  only  three  days  were  allowed  for 


70        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

the  experiment,  in  which  the  wood  was  seasoned  and 
sent  home.  The  two  heaviest  pieces  were  reduced 
in  weight  2£lbs.,  which  is  equal  to  two  pints  of 
water. 

It  is  ascertained  that,  by  this  means  of  drying,  the 
effect  of  age  has  been  given  to  the  instrument  made 
from  the  above  wood ;  and  it  became  first  fiddle  in  the 
orchestra  of  Her  Majesty's  Theatre.  The  wood  had 
been  in  the  possession  of  its  owners  for  eight  years ; 
and  it  was  sent  from  Switzerland,  in  the  first  instance, 
as  dry  wood.* 

COLUMBUS'S  OWN  SHIP  JODRNAL. 
COLUMBUS  has  left  us  some  charming  descriptions  of 
his  own  discoveries ;  though  it  is  only  recently  that 
we  have  obtained  the  knowledge  of  his  own  ship's 
journal,  of  his  letters  to  the  treasurer  Sanchez,  to 
Donna  Juana  de  la  Torre,  governess  of  the  infant  Don 
Juan,  and  to  Queen  Isabella.  Humboldt  has  sought 
to  show  with  how  deep  a  feeling  and  perception  of  the 
forms  and  the  beauty  of  nature  the  great  discoverer 
was  endowed,  and  how  he  described  the  face  of  the 
earth,  and  the  "  new  heaven"  which  opened  to  his 
view,  with  a  beauty  and  simplicity  of  expression  which 
can  only  be  fully  appreciated  by  those  who  are  familiar 
with  the  ancient  force  of  the  language  as  it  existed  at 
the  period. 

*  In  proof  of  the  economy  of  Messrs.  Davison  and  Syming- 
ton's invention  applied  to  the  manufacture  and  cleansing  of 
brewers'  casks,  it  is  stated  that  through  its  adoption  at  Truman's 
brewery,  Spitalflelds,  a  saving  of  300  tons  of  coals  was  effected 
annually. 


COLUMBUS1  S  OWN  SHIP  JOURNAL.    71 

The  aspect  and  the  physiognomy  of  the  vegetation,  the 
impenetrable  thickets  of  the  forest,  "  in  which  one  can 
hardly  distinguish  which  are  the  flowers  and  leaves  be- 
longing to  each  stem ;"  the  wild  luxuriance  which  clothed 
the  humid  shores ;  the  rose-coloured  flamingoes  fishing 
at  the  mouth  of  the  rivers  in  the  early  morning,  and 
giving  animation  to  the  landscape,  attract  the  atten- 
tion of  the  old  navigator  while  sailing  along  the  coast 
of  Cuba,  between  the  small  Lucayan  islands  and  the 
Jardinillos.  Each  newly-discovered  laud  appears  to 
him  still  more  beautiful  than  those  he  had  before  de- 
scribed; he  complains  that  he  cannot  find  words  in 
which  to  record  the  sweet  impressions  which  he  has 
received. 

"The  loveliness  of  this  new  land,"  says  the  dis- 
coverer, "far  surpasses  that  of  the  Campina  de  Cordoba. 
The  trees  are  all  bright  with  ever-verdant  foliage,  and 
perpetually  laden  with  fruits.  The  plants  on  the 
ground  are  tall  and  full  of  blossoms.  The  breezes  are 
mild  like  those  in  April  in  Castille ;  the  nightingales 
sing  more  sweetly  than  I  can  describe.  At  night, 
other  small  birds  sing  sweetly,  and  I  also  hear  our 
grasshoppers  and  frogs.  Once  I  came  into  a  deeply- 
enclosed  harbour,  and  saw  high  mountains  which  no 
human  eye  had  seen  before,  from  which  lovely  waters 
streamed  down.  The  mountain  was  covered  with 
firs,  pines,  and  other  trees  of  very  various  form,  and 
adorned  with  beautiful  flowers.  Ascending  the  river, 
which  poured  itself  into  the  bay,  I  was  astonished  at 
the  cool  shade,  the  crystal  clear  water,  and  the  number 
of  singing  birds.  It  seemed  as  if  I  could  never  quit  a 


72        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

spot  so  delightful — as  if  a  thousand  tongues  would  fail 
to  describe  it,  as  if  the  spell -bound  hand  would  refuse 
to  write." 

We  have  here,  from  the  journal  of  an  unlettered 
seaman,  the  power  which  the  beauty  of  nature,  mani- 
fested in  her  individual  forms,  may  exert  on  a  sus- 
ceptible mind.  Feelings  ennoble  language ;  for  the 
prose  of  the  admiral,  especially  when,  on  his  fourth 
voyage,  at  the  age  of  67,  he  relates  his  wonderful 
dream  on  the  coast  of  Veragua,  is,  if  not  more  elo- 
quent, yet  far  more  moving",  than  the  allegorical  pas- 
toral romance  of  Boccacio  and  the  two  Arcadias  of 
Sannazaro  and  Sydney ;  than  Garcilasso's  Salicio  y 
Nemoroso;  or  than  the  Diana  of  Jorge  de  Monte- 
mayor.  

EARLY   INCITEMENTS   TO    A    SCIENTIFIC    STUDY 

OF   NATURE. 

BARON  HUAIBOLDT,  in  the  opening  of  his  Cosmos,  vol. 
ii.,  recals  the  lessons  of  experience,  which  tell  us  how 
often  impressions  received  by  the  senses  from  circum- 
stances, seemingly  accidental,  have  so  acted  on  the 
youthful  mind  as  to  determine  the  whole  direction  of 
the  man's  course  through  life.  Childish  pleasure,  in 
the  form  of  countries  and  of  seas,  as  delineated  in 
maps ;  the  desire  to  behold  those  southern  constella- 
tions which  have  never  risen  in  our  horizon  ;  the  sight 
of  palms  and  of  the  cedars  of  Lebanon,  figured  in  a 
pictorial  Bible,  may  have  implanted  in  the  spirit  the 
first  impulse  to  travel  in  distant  lands. 

"If  I  might  (says  llumboldt)  have  recourse  to  my 


THE  RIGHTS  OF  WHITEBAIT.         73 

own  experience,  and  say  what  awakened  in  me  the 
first  beginnings  of  an  inextinguishable  longing  to  visit 
the  tropics,  I  should  name  George  Forster's  descriptions 
of  the  islands  of  the  Pacific — paintings,  by  Hodge, 
in  the  house  of  Warren  Hastings,  in  London,  re- 
presenting the  banks  of  the  Ganges — and  a  colossal 
dragon-tree  in  an  old  tower  of  the  Botanic  Gardens  at 
Berlin."  

THE    RIGHTS    OF   WHITEBAIT. 

FORMERLY,  whitebait  were  considered  to  be  the  young 
of  the  shad  ;  and  only  of  late  years  has  the  misnamed 
fish  taken  its  proper  position.  It  appears  that  Mr 
Yarrell,  the  able  naturalist,  was  one  morning  in  March 
struck  with  the  early  appearance  of  whitebait  in  a 
fishmonger's  shop  in  St.  James's ;  and  knowing  that 
shads,  which  they  were  supposed  to  be,  did  not  make 
their  appearance  till  much  later  (May),  he  took  up  the 
matter,  and  persevered  in  a  course  of  investigation, 
which  lasted  from  March  to  August,  1828.  The 
specific  distinction  between  the  two  fishes,  on  which 
Mr.  Yarrell  relies  as  of  the  greatest  value,  is  the  dif- 
ference of  their  anatomical  character  ;  and  especially 
in  the  number  of  vertebrae,  or  small  bones,  extending 
from  the  back-bone.  "  The  number  of  vertebrae  in 
the  shad,"  he  states,  "  of  whatever  size  the  specimen 
may  be,  is  invariably  fifty-five,  while  the  number  in 
the  whitebait  is  uniformly  fifty-six ;  even  in  a  fish  or 
two  inches,  with  the  assistance  of  a  lens,  their  exact 
number  may  be  distinctly  made  out." 


74         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

CATCHING    ELECTRIC   EELS. 

HUMBOLDT  gives  a  very  interesting  narrative  of 
the  mode  of  the  capture  of  the  gymnoti  employed 
by  the  Indians  of  South  America.  This  is  done  by 
rousing  the  eels  by  driving  horses  and  mules  into 
the  ponds  which  those  fish  inhabit,  and  harpooning 
them  when  they  have  exhausted  their  electricity  upon 
the  unhappy  quadrupeds. 

"  I  wished,"  says  Humboldt,  "  that  a  clever  artist  could  have 
depicted  the  most  animated  period  of  the  attack ;  the  groups  of 
Indians  surrounding  the  pond,  the  horses,  with  their  manes  erect, 
and  eye-balls  wild  with  pain  and  fright,  striving  to  escape  from 
the  electric  storm  which  they  had  roused,  and  driven  back  by 
the  shouts  and  long  whips  of  the  excited  Indians,  the  livid 
yellow  eels,  like  great  water-snakes,  swimming  near  the  surface, 
and  pursuing  their  enemy :  all  these  objects  presented  a  most 
picturesque  and  exciting  ensemble.  In  less  than  five  minutes, 
two  horses  were  killed :  the  eel,  being  more  than  five  feet  in 
length,  glides  beneath  the  body  of  the  horse,  and  discharges  the 
whole  strength  of  its  electric  organ  ;  it  attacks  at  the  same  time 
the  heart,  the  digestive  viscera,  and  above  all,  the  gastric  plexus 
of  nerves.  I  thought  the  scene  would  have  had  a  tragic  termi- 
nation, and  expected  to  see  most  of  the  quadrupeds  killed ;  but 
the  Indians  assured  me  that  the  fishing  would  soon  be  finished, 
and  that  only  the  first  attack  of  the  gymnoti  was  really  formid- 
able. In  fact,  after  the  conflict  had  lasted  a  quarter  of  an  hour, 
the  mules  and  horses  appeared  less  alarmed ;  they  no  longer 
erected  their  manes,  and  their  eyes  expressed  less  pain  and 
terror.  One  no  longer  saw  them  struck  down  in  the  water ;  the 
eels,  instead  of  swimming  to  the  attack,  retreated  from  their 
assailants,  and  approached  the  shore." 

The  Indians  now  began  to  use  their  missiles ;  and 
by  means  of  the  long  cord  attached  to  the  harpoon, 
jerked  the  fish  out  of  the  water  without  receiving  any 
shock  so  long  as  the  cord  was  dry.  All  the  circum* 
stances  narrated  by  Humboldt  establish  the  close 


HERSCHEUS  FIRST  TELESCOPE.       75 

analogy  between  the  gymnotus  and  torpedo  in  the 
vital  phenomenon  attending  the  exercise  of  their  ex- 
traordinary means  of  offence.  The  exercise  is  volun- 
tary and  exhaustive  of  the  nervous  energy ;  and,  like 
voluntary  muscular  effort,  it  needs  repose  and  nourish- 
ment to  produce  a  fresh  accumulation. 

SIR  WILLIAM  HERSCHEL'S  FIRST  TELESCOPE. 

SIK  WIULIAM  HEHSCHEL  arrived  in  England  from 
Hanover,  his  birth-place,  about  the  end  of  the  year 
1759,  when  he  was  in  his  21st  year.  He  was  bred  a 
professor  of  music,  and  went  to  live  at  Halifax,  where 
he  acquired,  by  his  own  application,  a  considerable 
knowledge  of  mathematics ;  and,  having  studied  astro- 
nomy and  optics  in  the  popular  writings  of  Ferguson, 
he  was  anxious  to  witness  with  his  own  eyes  the 
wonders  of  the  planetary  system.  He  accordingly 
borrowed  of  a  friend  a  telescope,  two  feet  in  focal 
length ;  and,  having  directed  it  to  the  heavens,  he  was 
so  delighted  with  the  actual  sight  of  phenomena,  which 
he  had  previously  known  only  from  books,  that  he 
commissioned  a  friend  to  purchase  for  him  in  London 
a  telescope,  with  a  high  magnifying  power.  Fortu- 
nately for  science,  the  price  of  such  an  instrument 
greatly  exceeded  his  means,  and  he  immediately  re- 
solved to  construct  a  telescope  with  his  own  hands. 
After  encountering  the  difficulties  which  every  amateur 
at  first  experiences,  in  the  casting,  grinding,  and 
polishing,  of  metallic  specula  for  reflecting  telescopes, 
he  completed,  in  1776,  a  reflecting  instrument,  five 


76         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

feet  in  focal  length,  with  which  he  was  able  to  observe 
the  ring  of  Saturn,  and  the  satellites  and  belts  of 
Jupiter.  This  telescope  was  completed  when  he 
resided  at  Bath,  where  he  acquired  by  degrees,  and  in 
his  leisure  hours,  that  practical  knowledge  of  optics 
and  mechanics  which  was  necessary  for  such  a  task. 

His  experience  in  this  scientific  art  was  of  the  most  re- 
markable kind ;  and,  by  1 78 1 ,  he  had  constructed  so  many 
telescopes,  as  to  be  better  furnished  with  the  means  of 
surveying  the  heavens  than  were  possessed  by  any 
other  astronomer,  in  either  of  the  fixed  observatories  in 
Europe.  _____ 

WONDERS    OF   AUSTRALIA. 

SYDNEY  SMITH  has  thus  sketched  a  few  of  the  natural 
wonders  of  this  new  world : — "  In  this  remote  part  01 
the  earth,  Nature  (having  made  horses,  oxen,  ducks, 
geese,  oaks,  elms,  and  all  regular  and  useful  produc- 
tions, for  the  rest  of  the  world)  seems  determined  to 
have  a  bit  of  play,  and  to  amuse  herself  as  she  pleases. 
Accordingly,  she  makes  cherries  with  the  stone  out- 
side ;  and  a  monstrous  animal,  as  tall  as  a  grenadier, 
with  the  head  of  a  rabbit,  a  tail  as  big  as  a  bedpost, 
hopping  along  at  the  rate  of  five  hops  to  a  mile,  with 
three  or  four  young  kangaroos  looking  out  of  its 
false  uterus,  to  see  what  is  passing.  Then  comes  a 
quadruped,  as  big  as  a  large  cat,  with  the  eyes,  colour, 
and  skin  of  a  mole,  and  the  bill  and  web-feet  of  a 
duck,  puzzling  Dr.  Shaw,  and  rendering  the  latter 
half  of  his  life  miserable,  from  his  utter  inability  to 
determine  whether  it  was  a  bird  or  a  beast.  Add  to 


VICISSITUDES  OF  MINING.  77 

this,  a  parrot  with  the  legs  of  a  sea-gull ;  a  skate  with 
the  head  of  a  shark  ;  and  a  bird  of  such  monstrous  di- 
mensions, that  a  side-bone  of  it  will  dine  three  real 
carnivorous  Englishmen ; — together  with  many  other 
productions  that,  on  the  discovery  of  the  country,  agi- 
tated Sir  Joseph  Banks,  and  filled  him  with  emotions  of 
distress  and  delight."  

VICISSITUDES    OF   MINING. 

HUMBOLDT  relates  of  a  Frenchman,  Joseph  Laborde, 
that  he  went  to  Mexico  very  poor  in  1743,  and  ac- 
quired a  large  fortune  in  a  very  short  time  by  the 
mine  of  La  Canada.  After  building  a  church  at  Tasco, 
which  cost  him  84,000/.,  he  was  reduced  to  the*  lowest 
poverty  by  the  rapid  decline  of  those  very  mines,  from 
which  he  had  annually  drawn  from  130,000  to  190,000 
pounds'  weight  of  silver.  With  a  sum  of  20,OOOZ., 
raised  by  selling  a  sun  of  solid  gold,  which,  in  his 
prosperity,  he  had  presented  to  the  church,  and  which 
he  was  allowed  by  the  archbishop  to  withdraw,  he 
undertook  to  clear  out  an  old  mine,  in  doing  which  he 
lost  the  greatest  part  of  the  produce  of  this  golden  sun, 
and  then  abandoned  the  work.  With  the  small  sum 
remaining,  he  once  more  ventured  on  another  under- 
taking, which  was,  for  a  short  time,  highly  productive ; 
and  he  left  behind  him,  at  his  death,  a  fortune  of 
120,0002.  

TROPICAL   DELIGHTS. 

WHAT  a  ludicrous  picture  has  Sydney  Smith  drawn  of 
the  animal  annoyance  of  tropical  climates.  "Insects," 


78        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

he  says,  "  are  their  curse.  The  bete  rouge  lays  the 
foundation  of  a  tremendous  ulcer.  In  a  moment,  you 
are  covered  with  ticks.  Chigoes  bury  themselves  in 
your  flesh,  and  hatch  a  large  colony  of  young  chigoes 
in  a  few  hours.  They  will  not  live  together,  but  every 
chigoe  sets  up  a  separate  ulcer,  and  has  his  own  pri- 
vate portion  of  pus.  Flies  get  into  your  mouth,  into 
your  eyes,  into  your  nose  ;  you  eat  flies,  drink  flies, 
and  breathe  flies.  Lizards,  cockroaches,  and  snakes 
get  into  your  bed ;  ants  eat  up  the  books ;  scorpions 
sting  you  on  the  foot.  Everything  bites,  stings,  or 
bruises.  Every  second  of  your  existence,  you  are 
wounded  by  some  piece  of  animal  life,  that  nobody 
has  ever  seen  before,  except  Swammerdam  and 
Merian.  An  insect  with  eleven  legs  is  swimming  in 
your  tea-cup ;  a  nondescript,  with  nine  wings,  is  strug- 
gling in  the  small-beer ;  or  a  caterpillar,  with  several 
dozen  of  eyes  in  his  belly,  is  hastening  over  the  bread 
and  butter.  All  nature  is  alive,  and  seems  to  be 
gathering  all  her  entomological  hosts  to  eat  you  up,  as 
you  are  standing,  out  of  your  coat,  waistcoat,  and 
breeches.  Such  are  the  tropics.  All  this  reconciles 
us  to  our  dews,  fogs,  vapours,  and  drizzle ;  to  our 
apothecaries  rushing  about  with  gargles  and  tinctures ; 
to  our  old  British  constitutional  coughs,  sore  throats, 
and  swelled  faces." 

INVENTION    OF   THE    DIVING-BELL. 
IN  the  United  States  of  America,  generally,  and  to 
some  extent  in  England,  the  invention  of  the  diving- 
bell  has  been  attributed  to  Sir  William  Phipps  ;  who 


ELECTRIC  EEL  EXPERIMENTS.       79 

was,  however,  one  of  the  first  persons  who  used  the 
bell  advantageously,  in  recovering  nearly  300,000^ 
treasure  from  a  Spanish  wreck,  near  the  Bahamas.  The 
invention,  or  the  earliest  use  of  the  diving-bell,  dates 
from  upwards  of  a  century  before  the  birth  of 
Phipps ;  the  first  instance  of  its  use  being  at  Cadiz, 
in  the  presence  of  Charles  V.,  in  1538 ;  whereas  Phipps 
was  born  at  Pemaguid,  in  America,  in  1650.  There 
is,  likewise,  another  popular  error,  that  the  Mulgrave 
family,  of  which  the  present  head  is  the  Marquess  of 
Normanby,  descended  from  Sir  William  Phipps ;  the 
founder  of  the  Mulgrave  family  being  Phipps,  one  of 
the  earliest  explorers  of  the  Arctic  regions. 


EXPERIMENTS  WITH  AN  ELECTRIC  EEL. 
Iy  1838  there  was  brought  to  London,  and  exhibited 
at  the  Adelaide  Gallery,  in  the  Strand,  a  living  speci- 
men of  the  electric  eel,  or  gymnotus,  being  the  first 
received  in  this  country  alive  within  the  present  cen- 
tury. It  was  fed  upon  fish,  and  occasionally  with 
bullock's  blood,  and  was  kept  warm  by  water,  arti- 
ficially heated.  With  this  eel  several  interesting  ex- 
periments were  made,  allowing  periods  of  rest  from  a 
week  to  a  month  between  each  set.  One  of  these  is 
thus  described : — 

"  I  was  so  fortunate  (says  Professor  Owen)  as  to 
witness  the  experiments  performed  by  Professor  Fara- 
day on  the  large  gymnotus  which  was  so  long  pre- 
served at  the  Adelaide  Gallery,  in  London.  That  the 
most  powerful  shocks  were  received  when  the  one 
hand  grasped  the  head,  and  the  other  hand  the  tail  of 


80         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

the  g}Tmnotus,  I  had  painful  experience,  especially  at 
the  wrists,  the  elbow,  and  across  the  back.  But  our 
distinguished  experimenter  showed  us  that  the  nearer 
the  hands  were  together,  within  certain  limits,  the  less 
powerful  was  the  shock.  He  demonstrated  by  the 
galvanometer  that  the  direction  of  the  electric  current 
was  always  from  the  anterior  parts  of  the  animal  to 
the  posterior  parts,  and  that  the  person  touching  the 
fish  with  both  hands  received  only  the  discharge  of 
the  parts  of  the  organs  included  between  the  points 
of  contact.  Needles  were  converted  into  magnets; 
iodine  was  obtained  by  polar  decomposition  of  iodide 
of  potassium ;  and  availing  himself  of  this  test,  Pro- 
fessor Faraday  showed  that  any  given  part  of  the 
organ  is  negative  to  other  parts  before  it,  and  positive 
to  such  as  are  behind  it.  Finally,  heat  was  evolved, 
and  the  electric  spark  obtained." 


TALENT  AND  OPPORTUNITY. 
PEEVIOUS  to  the  year  1706,  the  brass  ordnance  for 
the  British  Government  was  cast  at  the  foundry  in 
Moorfields ;  but  an  accident  which  occurred  there  at 
the  above  date,  led  to  the  removal  of  the  foundry  to 
Woolwich.  The  circumstances  connected  with  this 
change  are  interesting,  as  well  as  instructive. 

It  appears  that  a  great  number  of  persons  had  as- 
sembled to  witness  the  re-casting  of  the  cannon  taken 
by  the  Duke  of  Marlborough  from  the  French ;  and 
there  happened  to  be  among  them,  a  young  German 
artisan  in  metal,  named  Schalch.  Observing  some  mois- 
ture in  the  moulds,  he  pointed  out  to  the  spectators 


TALENT  AND  OPPORTUNITY.          81 

around  him  the  danger  likely  to  ensue  from  an  explo- 
sion of  steam,  when  the  moulds  were  filled  with  the 
heated  metal ;  and  at  the  instigation  of  his  friends, 
this  apprehension  was  conveyed  through  Colonel  Arm- 
strong, major-general  of  the  Ordnance,  to  the  Duke 
of  Richmond,  then  in  attendance,  as  the  head  of  the 
department.  This  warning  was,  however,  disregarded ; 
but  Schalch  retired  from  the  spot  with  as  many  of  the 
bystanders  as  he  could  persuade  to  accompany  him. 
They  had  not  proceeded  far  before  the  furnaces  were 
opened,  and,  as  Schalch  had  foretold,  a  dreadful  explo- 
sion ensued.  The  water  in  the  moulds  was  converted 
into  steam,  which  from  its  expansive  force  caused  a 
fiery  stream  of  liquid  metal  to  dart  out  in  every  direc- 
tion. Part  of  the  roof  of  the  building  was  blown  off, 
and  the  galleries  that  had  been  erected  for  the  com- 
pany were  swept  to  the  ground.  Most  of  the  foundry- 
men  were  terribly  burnt ;  some  were  killed  ;  and  many 
of  the  spectators  were  severely  injured. 

A  few  days  afterwards,  in  answer  to  an  advertise- 
ment in  the  newspapers,  Schalch  waited  upon  Colonel 
Armstrong,  and  was  informed  by  him  that  the  Board 
of  Ordnance  contemplated  building  a  new  foundry, 
and  had  determined,  from  the  representations  made  to 
them  of  Schalch's  ability,  to  offer  him  the  super- 
intendence of  its  erection,  and  the  management  of  the 
entire  establishment,  when  completed.  Schalch  readily 
accepted  the  appointment :  he  fixed  upon  the  Warren 
at  Woolwich,  as  the  most  eligible  site  for  the  new 
building ;  and  the  ordnance  which  were  cast  here  under 
his  direction  were  highly  approved  of.  Thus,  almost 
F 


82         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

by  mere  chance,  was  the  young  German  appointed  to  a 
situation  of  great  trust  and  emolument,  which  he  filled 
so  ably,  that  during  the  many  years  he  was  superin- 
tendent of  the  Royal  Arsenal,  not  a  single  accident 
occurred,  amidst  all  the  dangerous  operations  of  gun- 
casting.  He  retired,  after  sixty  years  service,  to 
Charlton,  where  he  died;  and  his  tomb  may  be  seen 
in  Woolwich  church- yard. 


TRAVELLING  IN  THE  HIMALEH  MOUNTAINS. 
THE  perils  of  the  heights  and  passes  of  the  Himaleh 
are  truly  frightful.  At  Boorendo,  15,171  feet  in 
height,  one  of  the  safest  and  most  frequented  of  the 
passes,  the  guides  point  out  a  spot  where  upwards  of 
twenty  persons,  returning  from  Koonacour  with  salt, 
a  few  years  since,  perished  at  once :  they  were  over- 
taken by  a  fall  of  snow  when  on  the  other  side,  but 
they  preferred  trying  the  pass  to  making  a  circuit  of 
six  or  seven  days'  journey  ;  the  wind  got  up,  and  they 
were  so  benumbed  with  cold  by  the  time  they  reached 
the  trees,  that  they  were  unable  to  strike  a  light,  and 
slept  to  wake  no  more. 

The  road  to  Ludak  is  passable  in  the  middle  of 
winter,  and  is  never  shut  by  snow;  but  there  are 
frightful  accounts  of  frosts  on  this  route.  As  pro- 
tection against  these  perils,  travellers  clothe  them- 
selves in  their  journeys  with  a  winter -dress,  which  is 
so  heavy  that  it  scarcely  seems  possible  for  them  to 
walk.  Putee  Ram,  a  traveller,  is  described  as  wearing 
a  garment  of  lambskin,  called  Lapka,  with  sleeves ;  the 
fleecy  side  was  inward,  and  the  exterior  covered  with 


GOLD  IN  SIBERIA.  83 

sooklat,  a  kind  of  warm  blanket,  dyed  blue.  There 
were  trousers  of  the  same,  long  woollen  stockings,  and 
over  them  the  usual  kind  of  boots,  the  foot  part  stuffed 
with  two  inches  of  wool ;  and  gloves  of  thick  flannel 
reaching  above  the  elbows ;  in  addition  to  this,  he  had 
a  blanket  round  his  waist,  another  thrown  on  hia 
shoulders,  and  a  shawl  wrapt  over  his  cap  and  part  of 
his  face ;  such,  he  said,  was  the  usual  garb  of  a  traveller 
in  the  winter  season ;  adding,  that  he  was  always  ac- 
companied by  a  mule-load  of  blankets  and  another 
Lapka,  all  of  which  were  required  at  night,  when  he 
was  obliged  to  sleep  under  the  snow. 


GOLD    IN    SIBERIA. 

THE  reign  of  the  Emperor  Nicholas  has  been  distin- 
guished by  the  important  discovery,  that  portions  of 
the  great  eastern  regions  of  Siberia  are  highly  auri- 
ferous ;  viz.,  the  government  of  Tomsk  and  Teniseik, 
where  low  ridges,  similarly  constructed  to  those  on 
the  eastern  flank  of  the  Ural,  and  like  them,  trending 
from  north  to  south,  appear  as  offsets  from  the  great 
east  and  west  chain  of  the  Altai,  which  separates  Siberia 
from  China.  And  here,  it  is  curious  to  remark,  that 
a  very  few  years  ago,  this  distant  region  did  not  afford 
a  third  part  of  the  gold  which  the  Ural  produced  ;  but 
by  recent  researches,  an  augmentation  so  rapid  and 
extraordinary  has  taken  place,  that  in  ]  843  the  eastern 
Siberian  tract  yielded  considerably  upwards  of  two- 
and-a-quarter  millions  sterling,  raising  the  total  gold 
produce  of  the  Russian  empire  to  nearly  three  millions 
sterling!— Sir  R.  I.  Murchison. 


84        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

COMBINATIONS  OF  THE  KALEIDOSCOPE. 
THE  system  of  endless  changes  is  one  of  the  most 
astonishing  properties  of  the  Kaleidoscope.  With  a 
number  of  loose  objects — pieces  of  glass,  for  example, 
— it  is  possible  to  reproduce  any  figure  we  have  admired, 
when  it  is  once  lost.  Centuries  may  elapse  before  the 
same  combination  returns  ;  if  the  objects,  however, 
are  placed  in  the  cell  so  as  to  have  very  little  motion, 
the  same  figure  may  be  recalled,  and  if  actually  fixed, 
the  same  pattern  will  return  in  every  evolution  of  the 
object-plate.  A  calculation  of  the  number  of  forms 
is  given  upon  the  ordinary  principles  of  combination  ; 
namely,  that  twenty-four  pieces  of  glass  may  be  com- 
bined 13,917,242,888,872,552,999,425,128,493,402, 
200  times — an  operation  the  performance  of  which 
would  take  hundreds  of  thousands  of  millions  of  years, 
even  upon  the  supposition  that  twenty  combinations 
were  effected  every  minute ! 


"  THE  MEANS  TO  THE  END." 
FROM  the  abundance  of  clay  upon  its  site,  London  is, 
ts  might  be  expected,  a  brick-built  city ;  although  the 
ingenuity  of  our  age  has  cased  miles  of  streets  with 
cement,  to  imitate  stone.  This  prevalence  of  clay  is, 
in  great  measure,  explanatory  of  the  vastness  of  the 
metropolis.  It  is  nowhere  better  illustrated  than  in 
the  fact  of  "  the  Five  Fields,"  (between  Pimlico  and 
Chelsea,)  formerly  a  clayey  swamp,  being  now  the  site 
of  some  of  the  finest  mansions  in  London.  A  few  years 
ago,  the  clay  retained  so  much  water  that  no  one  would 


INDIA  RUBBER.  85 

build  there,  and  "  the  Fields"  were  the  terror  of  foot- 
passengers  proceeding  from  Westminster  to  Chelsea 
after  nightfall.  At  length,  Mr.  Cubitt,  on  examining 
the  strata,  found  them  to  consist  of  clay  and  gravel,  of 
inconsiderable  depth.  The  clay  he  removed,  and  burned 
into  bricks;  and  by  building  upon  the  substratum  of 
gravel,  he  converted  this  spot  from  the  most  unhealthy 
to  one  of  the  most  healthy,  to  the  immense  advantage  of 
the  ground  landlord  and  the  whole  metropolis.  This 
is  one  of  the  most  perfect  adaptations  of  the  means  to 
the  end,  to  be  found  in  the  records  of  the  building  art. 


INDIA  .RUBBER,  A  CENTURY  AND  A   HALF 

SINCE . 

EVERT  generation  is  wisest  in  its  own  conceit,  and  the 
present  is  continually  overrated  at  the  expense  of  the 
past.  Who  would  have  thought  that  India  rubber 
cloaks  were  worn  in  South  America  upwards  of  a  cen- 
tury since  ?  yet  such,  forsooth,  is  the  plain  fact  of  his- 
tory ;  and  disinclined  as  we  are  to  rob  Mr.  Macintosh 
of  the  merit  of  his  adaptation,  the  invention  must  be 
awarded  to  another  age ;  indeed,  it  is  almost  one  of 
the  antiquities  of  the  New  World.  In  a  work  entitled 
La  Monarchia  Indiana,  printed  at  Madrid  in  1723,  we 
find  a  chapter  devoted  to  "Very  profitable  trees  in 
New  Spain,  from  which  there  distil  various  liquors 
and  resins."  Among  them  is  described  a  tree  called 
ulquahuill,  which  the  natives  cut  with  a  hatchet,  to 
obtain  the  white,  thick,  and  adhesive  milk.  This 
when  coagulated,  they  made  into  balls,  called  ulli,  which 
rebounded  very  high,  when  struck  to  the  ground,  and 


86        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

were  used  in  various  games.  It  was  also  made  into 
shoes  and  sandals.  The  author  continues  : — "  Our 
people  (the  Spaniards)  make  use  of  their  ulli  to  varnish 
their  cloaks,  made  of  hempen  cloth,  for  wet  weather^ 
which  are  good  to  resist  water,  but  not  against  the 
sun,  by  whose  heat  and  rays  the  ulli  is  dissolved." 

India  rubber  is  not  known  in  Mexico  at  the  present 
day  by  any  other  name  than  that  of  ulli.  And  the 
oiled  silk  covering  of  hats  very  generally  worn  through- 
out the  country  by  travellers  is  always  called  ulli. 


BALLOON  VOYAGE  FROM  LONDON  TO  NASSAU. 

ON  Monday,  November  7,  1836,  Mr.  Monck  Mason 
and  Mr.  Robert  Holland  accompanied  Mr.  Green  in 
his  large  balloon  from  London  to  Weilburg,  in  the 
grand  duchy  of  Nassau,  in  Germany,  an  extent  of  500 
British  miles,  achieved  in  the  short  space  of  eighteen 
hours.  The  route  lay  through  a  considerable  portion 
of  the  five  kingdoms  of  England,  France,  Belgium, 
Prussia,  Germany,  and  the  Archduchy  of  Nassau ; 
•whilst  a  long  succession  of  cities,  including  London, 
Rochester,  Canterbury,  Dover,  Calais,  Cassel,  Ypres, 
Courtray,  Lille,  Oudenarde,  Ath,  and  Brussels,  (with 
the  renowned  fields  of  Waterloo  and  Genappe,) 
Namur,  Liege,  Spa,  Malmedy,  Coblentz,  and  a  whole 
host  of  intermediate  villages,  were  all  brought  within 
the  compass  of  the  aeronauts'  horizon ;  their  su- 
perior elevation  and  various  aberrations  enabling 
them  to  extend  far  beyond  what  might  be  expected 


ANTIQUITY  OF  REFINED  SUGAR.      87 

from  a  hasty  consideration  of  the  line  connecting  the 
two  extremities  of  the  route.  The  voyagers  returned 
to  London  by  steam,  and  Mr.  Monck  Mason  after- 
wards published  an  interesting  narrative  of  the  aeronau- 
tical voyage. 

The  appearance  which  the  balloon  exhibited  pre- 
vious to  the  ascent  was  very  strange.  Provisions 
calculated  for  a  fortnight's  consumption,  in  case  of 
emergency ;  ballast  to  the  amount  of  upwards  of  a  ton 
in  weight,  disposed  in  bags  of  different  sizes,  duly 
registered  and  marked;  together  with  an  unusual 
supply  of  cordage,  implements,  and  other  accessories 
to  an  aerial  excursion,  occupied  the  bottom  of  the  car : 
while,  all  around  the  hoop,  and  elsewhere  appended, 
hung  cloaks,  carpet-bags,  barrels  of  wood  and  copper, 
a  coffee- warmer  by  means  of  slaked  lime,  barometers, 
telescopes,  lamps,  wine  and  spirit  flasks,  with  many 
other  articles  designed  to  serve  the  purposes  of  a 
voyage  to  regions  where,  once  forgotten,  nothing 
could  be  supplied.  

ANTIQUITY   OF   REFINED    SUGAR. 

IT  appears  from  the  accounts  of  the  Chamberlain  of 
Scotland,  published  from  the  originals  in  the  Ex- 
chequer, that  in  the  year  1329,  loaves  of  sugar  were 
sold  in  Scotland  at  the  price  of  Is.  9|d.  (more  than  an 
ounce  of  standard  silver)  per  Ib.  Stow's  Survey  of 
London  states  sugar  refining  to  have  been  commenced 
in  England  about  1544  ;  and  upwards  of  four  centuries 
since  we  find  Margaret  Paston  writing  to  her  husband 
from  Norwich  thus : — "  I  pray,  that  ye  will  vouchsafe 
to  send  me  another  sugar-loaf,  for  my  old  one  is  done." 


83        INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

CLEARNESS   OF  THE    SKY   AT  THE    CAPE    OF 

GOOD    HOPE. 

Ax  observer  states  that  in  forty-two  successive  days 
at  the  Capo,  there  were  only  three  in  which  he  could 
not  see  Venus  in  broad  daylight.  Sir  John  Herschcl 
assures  us  that  he  has  written  a  letter  by  the  light  of 
an  eclipse  of  the  moon.  Under  these  circumstances, 
the  starry  heavens  presented  a  brilliance,  of  which  the 
inhabitants  of  the  northern  hemisphere  can  have  no 
conception  ;  the  line  from  Orion  to  Antinous  being 
remarkably  rich  and  brilliant,  and  appearing  as  a  con- 
tinuous blaze  of  light ;  with,  however,  a  few  patches  of 
the  sky  destitute  of  stars. 


INTRODUCTION  OF  THE  POTATO. 
THE  history  of  the  potato  affords  a  strong  illustration 
of  the  influence  of  authority.  For  more  than  two 
centuries,  the  use  of  this  invaluable  plant  was  vehe- 
mently opposed  :  at  last,  Louis  XV.  wore  a  bunch  of 
its  blossoms  in  the  midst  of  his  courtiers,  and  the  con- 
sumption of  the  root  became  universal  in  France. 


FARADAY,    AS    A   LECTURER. 

VON  RAUMER  acutely  observes  : — "  Mr.  Faraday  is 
not  only  a  man  of  profound  chemical  and  physical 
science,  (which  all  Europe  knows),  but  a  very  remark- 
able lecturer.  He  speaks  with  ease  and  freedom,  but 
not  with  a  gossiping  unequal  tone,  alternately  in- 
audible and  bawling,  as  some  very  learned  professors 
do ;  he  delivers  himself  with  clearness,  precision,  and 


THE  RAILWAY  SYSTEM  SUGGESTED.  89 

ability.  Moreover,  he  speaks  his  language  in  a  manner 
which  confirmed  me  in  a  secret  suspicion  I  had,  that 
a  great  number  of  Englishmen  speak  it  very  badly. 
Why  is  it  that  French  in  the  mouth  of  Mdlle.  Mars, 
German  in  that  of  Tieck,  and  English  in  that  of  Fara- 
day, seems  a  totally  different  language  ?  Because  they 
articulate  what  other  people  swallow  or  chew.  It  is  a 
shame  that  the  power  and  harmony  of  simple  speech 
(I  am  not  talking  of  eloquence,  but  of  vowels  and  con- 
sonants), that  the  tones  and  inflexions  which  God  has 
given  to  the  human  voice,  should  be  so  neglected  and 
abused.  And  those  who  think  they  do  them  full 
justice — preachers — generally  give  us  only  the  long 
straw  of  pretended  connoisseurs,  instead  of  the  chopped 
straw  of  the  dilettanti." 


THE  RAILWAY  SYSTEM  SUGGESTED. 
A  STRIKING  suggestion  of  the  extension  of  railway 
communication  into  a  "  system,"  as  connecting  lines 
are  now  called,  will  be  found  in  Sir  Richard  Phillips's 
Morning's  Walk  from  London  to  Kew,  published  in 
1813.  On  reaching  the  Surrey  Iron  Railway  at 
Wandsworth,  Sir  Richard  records  :  "  I  found  renewed 
delight  on  witnessing,  at  this  place,  the  economy  of 
horse  labour  on  the  Iron  Railway.  Yet  a  heavy  sigh 
escaped  me,  as  I  thought  of  the  inconceivable  millions 
which  have  been  spent  about  Malta,  four  or  five  of 
which  might  have  been  the  means  of  extending  double 
lines  of  iron  railway  from  London  to  Edinburgh, 
Glasgow,  Holyhead,  Milford,  Falmouth,  Yarmouth, 
Dover,  and  Portsmouth !  A  reward  of  a  single  thou- 


90         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

sand  would  have  supplied  coaches  and  other  vehicles, 
of  various  degrees  of  speed,  with  the  best  tackle  for 
readily  turning  out;  and  we  might,  ere  this,  have 
witnessed  our  mail  coaches  running  at  the  rate  of  10 
miles  an  hour,  drawn  by  a  single  horse,  or  impelled 
15  miles  an  hour  by  Slenkinsop's  steam-engine,  Such 
would  have  been  a  legitimate  motive  for  overstepping 
the  income  of  a  nation  ;  and  the  completion  of  so  great 
and  useful  a  work  would  have  afforded  rational  ground 
for  public  triumph  in  general  jubilees  !" 

The  writer  of  these  penetrative  remarks  lived  until 
1840,  so  that  he  had  the  gratification  of  witnessing  a 
triumph  akin  to  his  long-cherished  hope. 


LORD    BROUGHAM  S    BLUNDERS. 

DR.  YOUNG'S  theory  of  light  was  treated  with  the 
most  sovereign  contempt  by  Lord  Brougham,  in  the 
earlier  numbers  of  the  Edinburgh  Review;  and  Dr. 
Young  died  without  reaping  the  honour  of  his  dis- 
covery. The  theory  is  now  recognised  as  true ;  and 
M.  Arago  has  formally  vindicated  Dr.  Young  from 
the  noble  critic's  animadversion.*,  in  a  discourse  de- 
livered at  the  French  Institute. 

In  1809,  when  the  first  application  was  made  to 
Parliament  on  gas-lighting,  the  movers  in  the  project 
were  much  opposed;  a  committee  of  the  House  of 
Commons  was  granted,  but  the  application  terminated 
unsuccessfully ;  and  the  testimony  of  Mr.  Accum  to 
the  practicability  of  gas-lighting  exposed  him  to  the 
severe  animadversions  and  ridicule  of  Mr.  Brougham. 


THE  FIRST  KALEIDOSCOPE.  91 

WHO    FIRST    DOUBLED    THE    CAPE    OF    GOOD 

HOPE? 

u  WHY,  Vasco  de  Gama,  to  be  sure" — perhaps,  the 
reader  will  reply.  In  Portugal,  however,  a  much  more 
ancient  navigator  has  been  mentioned.  Vieyra,  an  old 
preacher  of  great  renown  at  Lisbon,  said  in  one  of  his 
sermons : — "  One  man  only  passed  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  before  the  Portuguese.  And  who  was  he  ?  and 
how  ?  It  was  Jonah,  in  the  whale's  belly.  The  whale 
(or  rather  great  fish)  went  out  of  the  Mediterranean 
because  he  had  no  other  course ;  he  kept  the  coast  of 
Africa  on  the  left,  scoured  along  Ethiopia,  passed  by 
Arabia,  took  post  in  the  Euphrates,  on  the  shores  of 
Nineveh,  and,  making  his  tongue  serve  as  a  plank, 
landed  the  prophet  there." 


THE  FIEST  KALEIDOSCOPE. 

WHEN,  by  a  happy  accident,  Sir  David  Brewster  had 
discovered  the  leading  principles  of  the  kaleidoscope 
•while  repeating  Biot's  experiments  on  the  action  of 
fluids  upon  light,  he  constructed  an  instrument  in 
which  he  fixed  permanently,  across  the  ends  of  the 
reflectors,  pieces  of  coloured  glass,  and  other  irregular 
objects.  But  it  was  not  till  some  time  afterwards  that 
the  great  step  towards  the  completion  of  the  instru- 
ment was  made,  in  the  idea  of  giving  motion  to  these 
objects,  which  were  placed  loosely  in  a  cell  at  the  end 
of  the  instrument.  When  this  idea  was  carried  into 
execution,  the  kaleidoscope  in  its  simple  form  was 
completed.  The  next  and  by  far  the  most  important 


92         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

step  of  the  inrention  was,  to  employ  a  draw  tube  and 
lens,  by  means  of  which  beautiful  forms  could  be 
created  from  objects  of  all  sizes,  and  at  all  distances 
from  the  observer.  In  this  way,  the  power  of  the 
kaleidoscope  was  indefinitely  extended,  and  every 
object  in  nature  could  be  introduced  into  the  picture, 
in  the  same  manner  as  if  these  objects  had  been  re- 
duced in  size,  and  actually  placed  at  the  end  of  the 
reflector. 


FERGUSON    AND    HIS   WIFE. 

JAMES  FERGUSON  and  his  wife  led  a  cat-and-dog  life, 
and  she  is  not  once  alluded  to  in  the  philosopher's 
autobiography.  About  the  year  1750,  one  evening, 
while  he  was  delivering  to  a  London  audience  a  lecture 
on  astronomy,  his  wife  entered  the  room  in  a  passion, 
and  maliciously  overturned  several  pieces  of  the  appa- 
ratus ;  when  all  the  notice  Ferguson  took  of  the 
catastrophe  was  the  observation  to  the  audience — 
"  Ladies  and  gentlemen,  I  have  the  misfortune  to  be 
married  to  this  woman." 


A  DESCENT  IN  A  DIVING  BELL. 
SIR  GEORGE  HEAD,  in  his  shrewdly  humorous  Home 
Tour,  gives  an  amusing  picture  of  a  pair  of  operative 
divers  whom  he  saw  in  the  Hull  docks.  Sir  George 
was  passing  as  the  workmen  were  raising  the  diving 
bell,  when  he  stepped  into  the  lighter  to  observe  the 
state  of  the  labourers  on  their  return  from  below.  He 
had  a  remarkably  good  view  of  their  features,  at  a 


SIR  HUMPHRY  DA  VY  AN  ANGLER.    93 

time  wheu  they  had  no  reason  to  expect  any  one  waa 
looking  at  them ;  for,  as  the  bell  was  raised  very 
slowly,  he  had  an  opportunity  of  seeing  within  it,  by 
stooping,  the  moment  its  side  was  above  the  gunwale 
of  the  lighter.  But,  Sir  George  shall  relate  what  he 
saw: — 

"  A  pair  of  easy-going,  careless  fellows,  each  with  a  red  night-cap 
on  his  head,  sat  opposite  one  another,  by  no  means  over-heated 
or  exhausted,  and  apparently  with  no  other  want  in  the  world 
than  that  of  '  summut  to  drink ;'  they  had  been  under  water 
exactly  two  hours.  I  asked  them  what  were  their  sensations  on 
going  down  ?  They  said  that,  before  a  man  was  used  to  it,  it 
produced  a  feeling  as  if  the  ears  were  bursting ;  that,  on  the  bell 
first  dipping,  they  were  in  the  habit  of  holding  their  noses ;  at 
the  same  time  of  breathing  as  gently  as  possible,  and  that  thus 
they  prevented  any  disagreeable  eflect :  they  added,  the  air  be- 
low was  hot,  and  made  a  man  thirsty ; — the  latter  observation, 
though  in  duty  bound  I  received  as  a  hint,  I  believe  to  be  true ; 
nevertheless,  the  service  cannot  be  formidable,  as  the  extra  pay 
is  only  one  shilling  per  day.  Had  there  been  any  thing  extra- 
ordinary to  see  below,  I  should  have  asked  permission  to  go 
down ;  but  the  water  was  by  no  means  clear,  and  the  muddy 
bottom  of  the  docks  was  not  a  sufficient  recompence  for  the  dis- 
agreeable sensation.  Two  men  descend  at  a  time,  and  four 
pump  the  air  into  the  bell  through  the  leathern  hose ;  the  bell  is 
nearly  a  square,  or  rather  an  oblong,  vessel  of  cast-iron,  with  ten 
bull's-eye  lights  at  the  top,  which  lights  are  fortified  within  by  a 
lattice  of  strong  iron  wire,  sufficient  to  resist  an  accidental  blow 
of  a  crowbar,  or  other  casualty.  »  »  Notwithstanding  the  great 
improvements  made  in  diving-bells  since  their  invention,  after 
all  precautions,  a  man  in  a  diving-bell  is,  certainly,  in  a  state  of 
awful  dependence  upon  human  aid :  in  case  of  the  slightest  ac- 
cident to  the  air-pump,  or  even  a  single  stitch  of  the  leathern 
hose  giving  way,  long  before  the  ponderous  vessel  could  be  raised 
to  the  surface,  life  must  be  extinct." 

SIR  HUMPHRY  DAVY  AN   ANGLER. 
LAYBACH,  in  Styria,  is  interesting,  for  having  been 
the  retreat  of   Sir  Humphry  Davy  not  long  before 


94         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY.   ' 

his  death  :  he  resided  in  an  hotel  here,  and  the  pretty 
daughter  of  the  hostess  relates  several  anecdotes  of 
him.  He  was  a  most  indefatigable  angler :  his  extra- 
ordinary success  in  transferring  the  trout  to  his  basket 
procured  for  him  the  title  of  "  the  English  wizard;" 
and  the  scared  peasants,  who  could  never  understand 
by  what  artificial  means  he  caught  the  fish,  shunned 
him  as  if  he  had  been  his  Satanic  majesty.  He  spent 
the  greater  part  of  the  day  in  angling,  or  in  geologiz- 
ing among  the  mountains ;  he  generally  passed  his 
evenings  in  the  company  of  his  hostess'  pretty  daughter, 
who  made  his  tea,  and  was  his  antagonist  at  e"carte, 
or  some  other  light  game ;  and  the  maid  of  the  inn 
played  her  cards  so  well,  that  she  secured  a  handsome 
legacy  from  the  philosopher  in  his  will. 


MISS  CAROLINE  LUCRETIA  HERSCHEL. 
THIS  very  interesting  lady  died  at  Hanover  on  the 
9th  of  January,  1848,  in  the  98th  year  of  her  age. 
She  was  the  sister  of  Sir  William  Herschel ;  and  con- 
sequently, aunt  to  Sir  John  Herschel,  the  present  re- 
presentative of  this  truly  scientific  family. 

Miss  Herschel  was  the  constant  companion  of  her 
brother,  and  sole  assistant  ol  his  astronomical  labours, 
to  the  success  of  which  her  indefatigable  zeal,  diligence, 
and  singular  accuracy  of  calculation,  not  a  little  con- 
tributed. From  the  first  commencement  of  his  astro- 
nomical pursuits,  her  attendance  on  both  his  daily 
labours  and  nightly  watches  was  put  in  requisition ; 
and  was  found  so  useful,  that  on  Herschel's  removal 
from  Bath  to  Datchet,  and  subsequently  to  Slough, 


MISS  CAROLINE  LUCRETIA  HERSCHEL.  95 

he  being  then  occupied  with  the  review  of  the  heavens 
and  other  researches,  she  performed  the  whole  of  the 
arduous  duties  of  his  astronomical  assistant ;  not  only 
reading  the  clocks  and  noting  down  all  the  observations 
from  dictation  as  an  amanuensis,  but  subsequently 
executing  the  extensive  and  laborious  numerical  cal- 
culations necessary  to  render  them  available  to  science. 
For  the  performance  of  these  duties,  his  majesty  King 
George  the  Third  was  pleased  to  place  her  in  the  re- 
ceipt of  a  salary  sufficient  for  her  singularly  moderate 
wants  and  retired  habits. 

Arduous,  however,  as  these  occupations  must  appear, 
especially  when  it  is  considered  that  her  brother's  ob- 
servations were  always  carried  on  (circumstances  per- 
mitting) till  daybreak,  without  regard  to  season,  and 
indeed  chiefly  in  winter,  they  proved  insufficient  to 
exhaust  her  activity.  In  the  intervals,  she  found  time 
both  for  astronomical  observations  of  her  own,  and  for 
the  execution  of  more  than  one  work  of  great  extent 
and  utility.  The  observations  she  made  with  a  small 
Newtonian  sweeper,  constructed  for  her  by  her  brother, 
with  which  she  found  no  less  than  eight  comets ;  and 
on  five  of  these  occasions  her  claim  to  the  first  dis- 
covery is  admitted.  These  sweeps  also  proved  pro- 
ductive of  the  detection  of  several  remarkable  nebulae 
and  clusters  of  stars,  previously  unobserved. 

On  her  brother's  death,  in  1822,  Miss  Herschel  re- 
turned to  Hanover,  which  she  never  again  quitted ; 
passing  the  last  twenty-six  years  of  her  life  in  repose 
— enjoying  the  society,  and  cherished  by  the  regard  of, 
her  remaining  relatives  and  friends ;  gratified  by  the 


90         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

occasional  visits  of  eminent  astronomers,  and  honoured 
with  many  marks  of  favour  and  distinction  on  the  part 
of  the  King  of  Hanover,  the  Crown  Prince,  and  his 
amiable  and  illustrious  consort.  To  within  a  very 
short  period  of  her  death,  her  health  continued  un- 
interrupted, her  faculties  perfect,  and  her  memory 
(especially  of  the  scenes  and  circumstances  of  former 
days)  remarkably  clear  and  distinct.  Her  end  was 
tranquil  and  free  from  suffering — a  simple  cessation 
of  life. 

We  append  the  following  just  and  eloquent  tribute 
to  the  merits  of  Miss  Herschel,  from  Dr.  Nichol's 
"  Views  of  the  Architecture  of  the  Heavens  :" — 

"  The  astronomer  (Sir  William  Herschel),  during  these  en- 
grossing nights,  was  constantly  assisted  in  his  labours  by  a 
devoted  maiden  sister,  who  braved  with  him  the  inclemency  of 
the  weather — who  heroically  shared  his  privations  that  she 
might  participate  in  his  delights — whose  pen,  we  are  told,  com- 
mitted to  paper  his  notes  of  observations  as  they  issued  from  his 
lips ; '  she  it  was,'  says  the  best  of  authorities, '  who,  having  passed 
the  nights  near  the  telescope;  took  the  rough  manuscripts  to 
her  cottage  at  the  dawn  of  day,  and  produced  a  fair  copy  of  the 
night's  work  on  the  ensuing  morning  ;  she  it  was  who  planned 
the  labour  of  each  succeeding  night,  who  reduced  every  observa- 
tion, made  every  calculation,  and  kept  everything  in  systematic 
order;'  she  it  was — Miss  Caroline  Herschel — who  helped  our 
astronomer  to  gather  an  imperishable  name.  This  venerable 
lady  has  in  one  respect  been  more  fortunate  than  her  brother ; 
she  has  lived  to  reap  the  full  harvest  of  their  joint  glory.  Some 
years  ago,  the  gold  medal  of  our  Astronomical  Society  was  trans- 
mitted to  her  at  her  native  Hanover,  whither  she  removed  after 
Sir  William's  death  ;  and  the  same  learned  Society  has  recently 
inscribed  her  name  upon  its  roll :  but  she  has  been  rewarded  by 
yet  more,  by  what  she  will  value  beyond  all  earthly  pleasures ; 
she  has  lived  to  see  her  favourite  nephew,  him  who  grew  up 
under  her  eye  unto  an  astronomer,  gather  around  him  the 
highest  hopes  of  scientific  Europe,  and  prove  himself  fully  equal 
to  tread  in  the  footsteps  of  his  father." 


INVENTION  OF  THE  TELESCOPE.     97 

TYCHO  BEAHE'S  CEEDULITY. 

THIS  great  astronomer  strongly — and  weakly — be- 
lieved in  the  predictions  of  astrology.  If,  when  he 
went  abroad,  he  met  an  old  woman,  or  a  hare  crossed 
his  path,  he  would  turn  back,  being  persuaded  that 
evil  was  threatened  him. 


INVENTION    OF   THE    TELESCOPE,  AND    EAELY 

DISCOVERIES   WITH   IT. 

IT  is  singular  that  the  epoch  of  the  most  extensive 
discoveries  upon  the  surface  of  our  planet  was  imme- 
diately succeeded  by  man's  first  taking  possession  of  a 
considerable  part  of  the  celestial  spaces  by  the  telescope 
The  powers  of  this  instrument  have  not  yet  reached 
their  limit.  The  feeble  commencement,  however 
hardly  magnifying  as  much  as  thirty-two  times  in 
linear  dimension,  enabled  astronomers  to  penetrate 
into  cosmical  depths,  before  unknown.  The  acci- 
dental discovery  of  the  space-penetrating  power  of  the 
telescope  was  first  made  in  Holland,  probably  as  early 
as  the  close  of  1608.  According  to  the  latest  documen- 
tary investigations,  this  great  invention  may  be  claimed 
by  Hans  Lippershey,  a  native  of  Wesel  and  a  spectacle- 
maker  at  Middelburg,  who,  on  the  2nd  of  October, 
1608,  offered  to  the  States- General  certain  instruments 
"  with  which  one  can  see  to  a  distance."  Two  other 
persons,  Adrienz  and  Jansen,  made  a  similar  offer, 
nearly  at  the  same  time. 

When  the  news  of  the  Dutch  invention  reached 
Venice,  Galileo  was  accidentally  present ;  he  at  once 
a 


98         INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

divined  what  were  the  essential  conditions  of  the  con- 
struction, and  immediately  completed  a  telescope  at 
Padua  for  his  own  use.  He  directed  it  first  to  the 
mountains  in  the  moon ;  then  examined  with  small 
magnifying  powers  the  group  of  the  Pleiades,  the 
cluster  of  stars  in  Cancer,  the  Milky  Way,  and  the 
group  of  stars  in  the  head  of  Orion.  Then  followed 
in  quick  succession  the  great  discovery  of  the  four 
satellites  of  Jupiter,  the  two  "  handles"  of  Saturn,  or 
his  surrounding  ring  imperfectly  seen,  so  that  its  true 
character  was  not  at  once  recognised ;  the  solar  spots, 
and  the  crescent  form  of  Venus.  The  occultatious 
of  the  satellites,  or  their  entrance  into  the  shadow 
of  Jupiter,  led  to  the  knowledge  of  the  velocity  of 
light;  and  led  Galileo  to  perceive  their  importance  in 
the  determination  of  the  longitude  of  places  on  land. 

Galileo  carried  his  first  telescope  to  Venice,  where 
his  time  for  more  than  a  month  was  employed  in  show- 
ing and  explaining  its  nature  to  the  different  inhabit- 
ants. A  ludicrous  instance  is  related  of  the  insatiable 
telescope  mania  which  had  seized  on  the  people.  Galileo 
went  one  day  to  the  tower  of  St.  Mark,  in  order  to 
make  observations  on  its  summit,  but  the  people  espied 
him,  and  compelled  him  to  hand  a  telescope  which  he 
had  made  for  himself,  from  one  to  another,  until  all 
had  gratified  their  curiosity  by  having  a  peep ;  and. 
after  he  had  been  detained  several  hours,  he  was  not  a 
little  glad  to  regain  his  telescope,  and  return  home, 
But  this  was  not  all :  he  heard  them  inquiring  at  what 
inn  he  lodged  ;  and  foreseeing  the  inconvenience  of  the 
celebrity  which  was  beginning  to  attach  to  him,  he 


IDENTITY  OF  BLACK  AND  GREEN  TEA.  99 

left  Venice  early  the  next  morning,  to  pursue  his  ob- 
servations with  greater  privacy. 

Melancholy  is  it  to  relate  that  these  brilliant  dis- 
closures brought  temporary  disgrace  and  positive  suf- 
fering upon  their  author.  Galileo,  at  the  age  of  seventy- 
seven,  after  having  devoted  his  life  to  useful  and 
valuable  labours,  was  forced  to  abjure  his  philosophical 
opinions,  and  to  declare,  on  his  knees,  that  he  believed 
his  doctrines  concerning  the  motion  of  the  earth  round 
the  sun,  the  existence  of  solar  spots,  &c.,  to  be  false 
and  pernicious.  The  moral  firmness  of  the  old 
man  was  not  sufficient  to  make  him  brave  the  terrors 
of  the  Inquisition,  and  we  must  therefore  look  with  a 
lenient  eye  at  this  abjuration  of  doctrines  which  at  the 
very  moment  he  firmly  believed  to  be  true  :  but  what 
shall  we  say  of  those  men,  who,  under  the  plea  of  reli- 
gion, could  subject  so  noble  a  mind  to  such  humiliating 
degradation ! 


IDENTITY  OF  BLACK  AND  GREEN  TEA. 
GREEN  and  Black  Tea  are  produced  from  the  same 
plant,  though  the  botanists  were  long  at  issue  about 
this  matter  The  idea  of  green  tea  being  dried  upon 
copper  is  proved  to  be  a  popular  fallacy,  for  the  tea 
would  be  flavoured  and  spoiled  in  the  process ;  besides, 
the  bloom  can  be  given  by  harmless  means.  Dr. 
Lettsom,  by  the  way,  thought  it  was  given  by  a  ve- 
getable process. 

Mr.  Ball,  who  has  written  a  practical  volume  on 
"  the  Cultivation  and  Manufacture  of  Tea,"  describes 
an  experiment  made  by  him,  proving  that  tea  may  be 


100       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

dried  Hack  and  green,  at  once,  in  the  same  vessel  and 
over  the  same  fire  :  he  divided  the  pan,  and  the  leaves 
on  one  side  he  kept  in  motion,  and  the  other  quiet — 
when  the  latter  became  black,  and  the  former  green ; 
thus  proving  the  difference  of  colour  to  be  not  derived 
from  any  management  of  heat,  but  from  manipulation, 
the  heat  being  the  same  in  both  cases. 

At  the  same  time,  certain  Chinese  rogues  glaze  our 
hysons  most  unscrupulously ;  and  it  has  been  proved 
by  chemical  analysis,  that  the  Chinese  green  teas  are 
artificially  coloured,  though  not  with  indigo,  as  repre- 
sented by  the  green  tea  merchants.  We  may  add,  that 
gunpowder  tea  is  dried  at  the  highest  temperature,  and 
pekoe  at  the  lowest ;  and  the  chemical  cause  of  black 
tea  is  its  loss  of  tannin  in  its  drying,  previous  to 
roasting,  an  opinion  that  is  supported  by  the  testi- 
mony of  Liebig.  Again,  Mr.  Ball  thiuks  there  may 
be  one  species  of  tea  plant,  but  several  varieties,  and 
that  all  botanical  difference  is  destroyed  in  the  course 
of  packing. 

PROTECTION    BY    RUST. 

RUST  is  usually  associated  with  decay.  Professor 
Faraday,  however,  observes  that,  in  some  cases,  it  is 
curious  to  see  how  tin,  a  metal  having  a  slight  attrac- 
tion for  oxygen,  protects  other  metals  from  oxidation 
or  rust.  In  Canada,  tin-plate  is  used  for  the  roofs  of 
houses,  and  you  are  dazzled  by  the  lustre  of  the  setting 
sun  upon  the  roofs;  whilst  there,  although  it  is  exposed 
to  the  atmosphere  year  after  year,  it  does  not  decay, 
because  the  superficial  coat  of  oxide  protects  the  tin 
and  iron  beneath. 


TELESCOPIC  VIEW  OF  THE  MOON.  101 

THE  LION  EATEN  AS  FOOD. 

CAPTAIN  0.  KENNEDY,  in  his  "  Journey  through  Al- 
geria and  Tunis,"  notes  : — "  We  were  anxious  to  know 
if  there  was  any  chance  of  another  lion  being  found 
in  the  neighbourhood,  and  were  informed  that  doubt- 
less there  were  plenty;  but  such  was  the  nature  of 
the  ground,  that,  unless  their  exact  haunts  were  known 
(in  which  case  they  were  generally  killed),  we  might 
go  out  for  a  fortnight,  and  never  encounter  a  single 
beast.  The  skins  of  all  lions  killed  throughout  the 
regency  are  sent  to  the  Bey,  who  pays  a  handsome 
premium  upon  each.  The  flesh  is  eaten :  contrary 
to  our  expectation,  we  found  it  excellent,  and  made  a 
capital  supper  upon  the  ends  of  the  ribs,  stewed  with 
a  little  salt  and  red  pepper ;  it  tasted  like  very  young 
beef,  and  was  neither  tough  nor  strong  flavoured. " 


THE    MOON    SEEN    THROUGH   LORD    ROSSE'S 

TELESCOPE. 

IN  1846,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Scoresby  had  the  gratification 
of  observing  the  moon  through  the  stupendous  tele- 
scope constructed  by  Lord  Rosse,  at  Parsonstown.  It 
appeared  like  a  globe  of  molten  silver,  and  every  ob- 
ject of  the  extent  of  one  hundred  yards  was  quite 
visible.  Edifices,  therefore,  of  the  size  of  York  Minster, 
or  even  of  the  ruins  of  Whitby  Abbey,  might  be  easily 
perceived,  if  they  had  existed.  But  there  was  no  ap- 
pearance of  anything  of  that  nature ;  neither  was  there 
any  indication  of  the  existence  of  water,  or  of  an 


102       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

atmosphere.  There  were  a  great  number  of  extinct 
volcanoes,  several  miles  in  breadth;  through  one  of 
them  there  was  a  line  of  continuance  about  150  miles 
in  length,  which  ran  in  a  straight  direction,  like  a 
railway.  The  general  appearance,  however,  was  like 
one  vast  ruin  of  nature ;  and  many  of  the  pieces  of  rock 
driven  out  of  the  volcanoes,  appeared  to  lie  at  various 
distances. 

LONGEVITY  OF  THE  BEETLE. 
SOME  facts  recently  stated  to  the  British  Association 
may,  perhaps,  shake  faith  in  the  "  corporal  sufferance" 
of  the  beetle,  whose  cause  has  been  so  eloquently 
pleaded  by  Shakspeare.  Sir  G.  Richardson  has  ex- 
hibited a  beetle  found  imbedded  iu  some  artiicial 
concrete,  where  it  must  have  been  at  least  sixteen 
years ;  yet,  when  the  animal  was  brought  to  him,  it 
was  alive,  and  lived  for  six  weeks  after — the  ordinary 
duration  of  the  life  of  this  species  of  beetle  being  but 
two  or  three  years.  Mr.  Darwin  left  one  of  the  same 
kind  of  beetles  in  a  covered  vessel  for  a  year,  without 
its  being  killed ;  he  also  dropped  upon  one  hydro- 
cyanic acid,  but  it  walked  off,  quite  unaffected  by  the 
poison 

TOTAL  ECLIPSE  OF  THE  SUN. 
SAGUA  LA  GRANDE,  on  the  island  of  Cuba,  was  the 
only  place  where  total  darkness  was  produced  by  the 
eclipse  of  the  sun,  on  the  25th  of  July,  1846.  The  eclipse 
phenomenon  commenced  at  9h.41m.  32s.  a.m.,  sky  clear. 
As  the  time  of  the  total  darkness  approached,  all  aui« 


RATE  OF  BALLOON  TRAVELLING.     103 

mated  nature  gave  signs  of  approaching  night,  man 
only  excepted.  Still,  the  mirth  of  the  gay  donnas  and 
senoras  soon  ceased ;  the  slaves  abandoned  their  occu- 
pations, and  many  fell  on  their  knees.  The  darkness 
came  on  gradually,  and  at  17  minutes  past  11,  the  sun 
was  totally  obscured.  There  stood  the  moon,  covering 
the  whole  face  of  the  sun,  and  presenting  the  appear- 
ance of  a  great  black  ball  in  the  heavens,  with  rays  of 
light  diverging  from  behind  it.  The  rays  gave  out  a 
pale,  aurora-like  reflection  upon  the  earth,  resembling 
that  cast  by  the  moon  when  half- full.  This  lasted  only 
fifty  seconds ;  and,  at  a  little  past  12,  the  eclipse  ended. 


THE  DIVING-BELL 

WAS  first  used  in  Europe  at  Toledo,  in  Spain,  in  1538, 
before  Charles  V.  and  10,000  spectators.  The  ex- 
periment was  made  by  two  Greeks,  who,  taking  a  very 
large  kettle  suspended  by  ropes  with  the  mouth  down- 
ward, fixed  planks  in  it,  on  which  they  placed  them- 
selves, and  with  a  lighted  candle  gradually  descended 
to  a  considerable  depth. 

KATE  OF  BALLOON  TRAVELLING. 
MB.  GREEN  relates  some  singular  experiences  of  the 
variety  of  currents  in  our  atmosphere,  influencing  the 
rate  of  his  aerial  travelling.  He  has  found  that  at  a 
great  elevation,  the  north-west  current  generally  pre- 
vails throughout  the  year,  without  reference  to  the 
direction  of  the  wind  near  the  earth;  this  constant 
current  being  at  an  elevation  of  from  13,000  to  14,000 
feet.  This  upper  current  carries  his  balloon  at  the 


101       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

rate  of  six  miles  an  hour ;  whilst  the  lower  current 
wafts  it  at  the  rate  of  thirty  miles  an  hour.  He  states, 
that  in  one  of  his  ascents  from  Liverpool,  he  entered 
the  constant  current  at  an  elevation  of  14,000  feet,  and 
descended  into  a  lower  south-east  current  at  the  height 
of  12,000  feet ;  the  former  carrying  his  balloon  at  the 
rate  of  five  miles,  and  the  latter  at  the  rate  of  eighty 
miles  an  hour.  He  has  travelled  ninety-seven  miles 
in  fifty-eight  minutes,  and  his  speed  has  often  been 
from  sixty  to  eighty  miles  an  hour. 


SAFE  DESCENT  IN  A  PARACHUTE. 
THIS  feat,  of  very  rare  occurrence,  was  accomplished 
in  September,  1838,  when  Mr.  Hampton  ascended  with 
a  parachute  attached  to  a  gas  balloon,  from  Chelten- 
ham, to  the  height  of  9000  feet.  At  this  altitude,  he 
cut  the  connecting-cord,  when  the  balloon  rose  for 
some  hundred  feet,  and  burst ;  Mr.  Hampton  safely 
descending  in  the  parachute,  within  thirteen  minutes ; 
the  collapsed  balloon  having  reached  the  earth  before 
him. 

"FOSSIL  RAIN." 

IN  1838,  there  was  discovered  at  Liverpool,  the  im- 
pression of  a  fossil  shower  of  rain  upon  sandstone. 
Dr.  Buckland  observes  of  the  phenomenon: — "It 
could  not  be  mistaken  for  ripple  of  the  water,  that  was 
common  enough :  it  had  all  the  small-pox  character, 
the  pitted  appearance,  which  a  heavy  shower  of  rain 
would  leave,  and  which  would  be  covered  up  by  the 
next  tide,  and  so  preserved  to  future  generations." 


THE  ART  OF  STEREOTYPE.          105 

MELTING  OF  A  WATCH  BY  LIGHTNING. 
DUKING  a  violent  thunder-storm  in  3844,  a  fishing- 
boat,  belonging  to  one  of  the  Shetland  Islands,  was 
struck  by  lightning.  The  electric  fluid  came  down 
the  mast,  which  it  tore  into  shivers ;  and  melted 
a  watch  in  the  pocket  of  a  man  who  was  sitting  close 
by  the  side  of  the  mast,  without  injuring  him.  Not 
only  was  the  man  altogether  unhurt,  but  his  clothes 
also  were  uninjured  ;  and  he  was  not  aware  of  what 
had  taken  place  until,  on  taking  out  his  watch,  he 
found  it  was  fused  into  a  mass ! 


THE  INDIAN  JUGGLEKS  SECRET. 
LIEUTENANT  HUTTON  states,  that  the  snakes  which  the 
Indian  jugglers  handle  with  impunity  are  drugged 
with  opium,  which  renders  them  quiet  and  harmless. 
The  effects  of  the  drug  will  not  wear  off  for  a  fortnight 
or  three  weeks  ;  but  a  drugged  snake  which  Lieutenant 
Hutton  purchased,  after  the  lapse  of  three  weeks,  flew 
at  him  unexpectedly,  and  nearly  strangled  him. 


THE  ART  OF  STEREOTYPE. 

THE  first  person  mentioned  as  practising  the  modern 
art  of  stereotype,  was  a  Dutchman,  Van  der  Mey,  who 
resided  at  Leyden  about  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury. He  printed  four  books  from  solid  plates ;  but 
at  his  death  the  art  of  preparing  solid  blocks  was  lost, 
or  wholly  neglected.  In  1725,  however,  Mr.  Ged,  a 
jeweller  of  Edinburgh,  apparently  without  knowledge 


106       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

of  Van  dcr  Mey's  performances,  devised  the  plan  ol 
printing  from  plates  ;  and  in  1729  he  entered  into 
partnership  with  three  other  persons,  for  the  purpose 
of  prosecuting  the  art.  A  privilege  was  obtained  by 
the  company,  from  the  University  of  Cambridge,  to 
print  Bibles  and  Prayer-books ;  but  one  of  Ged's 
partners  was  so  averse  to  the  success  of  the  plan,  that 
he  engaged  such  people  for  the  work  as  he  thought 
most  likely  to  spoil  it.  The  compositors  wilfully  made 
errors  in  correcting,  and  the  pressmen  battered  the 
plates  when  the  masters  were  absent.  In  consequence, 
the  books  were  suppressed  by  authority,  and  the  plates 
melted.  Mr.  Ged,  with  the  help  of  his  son,  whom  he 
had  apprenticed  to  the  printing  trade,  actually  pro- 
duced, in  1736,  an  18mo  edition  of  Sallust ;  and  in 
1742  another  book  was  printed  in  Newcastle.  But 
after  the  death  of  Ged  and  his  son,  the  art  again  fell 
into  disuse,  till  in  1780  it  was  revived  by  Mr.  Tulloch 
of  Glasgow,  who  practised  it  in  partnership  with  Mr. 
Foulis,  the  University  printer. 

"  RAINING    TREES." 

DURING  Sir  John  Herschel's  residence  at  the  Cape  of 
Good  Hope,  he  often  observed  that  on  the  windward 
side  of  the  Table  Mountain  the  clouds  were  spread  out 
and  descended  very  low,  but  frequently  without  any 
rain  falling ;  while,  on  the  lee-side  they  poured  over 
the  precipitous  face  of  the  mountain,  producing  as  they 
rolled  out,  the  well-known  phenomenon  of  the  table- 
cloth. Sir  John,  however,  found  that  as  he  walked 
under  fir-trees  in  the  neighbourhood,  while  the  clouds 


TAME  HfJERA.  107 

were  closely  overhead,  he  was  subjected  to  a  copious 
shower ;  but  on  coming  from  beneath  the  trees  it 
was  fair.  On  inquiring  into  the  cause  of  this,  he 
ascertained  that  the  cloud  was  condensed  on  the  trees, 
and  thus  the  umbrella-shaped  tops  of  the  firs  acted  a 
part  quite  the  reverse  of  our  umbrellas  in  this  country, 
for  they  wetted  the  person  beneath  them,  instead  of 
keeping  him  dry. 

THE    INVISIBLE    DISPATCH. 

THE  plan  of  writing  with,  rice-water,  to  be  rendered 
visible  by  the  application  of  iodine,  was  practised  with 
great  success  in  the  correspondence  during  the  war  in 
Affghanistan.  The  first  letter  of  this  kind  was  re- 
ceived from  Jellalabad,  concealed  in  a  quill.  On  open- 
ing it,  a  small  paper  was  unfolded,  on  which  appeared 
only  a  single  word,- "iodine."  The  magic  liquid  was 
applied,  and  an  important  dispatch  from  Sir  Robert 
Sale  stood  forth. 

TAME   HY^lNA. 

WHEN  the  traveller,  Ignatius  Pallme,  was  at  Kordofan, 
he  saw  in  the  court  of  a  house  at  Lobeid,  a  hyaena 
running  about  quite  domesticated.  The  children  of 
the  proprietor  tamed  it,  took  the  meat  thrown  to  it  for 
food  out  of  its  jaws,  and  put  their  hands  even  to  its 
throat  without  receiving  the  slightest  injury.  When 
the  family  sat  down  to  dinner  in  the  open  air,  the 
animal  approached  the  table,  and  snapped  up  the  pieces 
that  were  thrown  to  it,  like  a  dog.  A  full-grown 


108       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

hyama  and  her  two  cubs,  on  another  occasion,  wera 
brought  to  our  traveller  for  sale  ;  the  latter  were  car- 
ried in  arms,  as  you  might  carry  a  lamb,  and  were  not 
even  muzzled.  The  old  one,  it  is  true,  had  a  rope 
round  her  snout,  but  she  had  been  led  a  distance  of 
twelve  miles  by  one  man  without  offering  the  least 
resistance.  The  Africans  do  not  even  reckon  the 
hyaena  among  the  wild  beasts  of  their  country,  for 
they  are  not  afraid  of  it. 


NOVEL  TRAVELLING  CARRIAGE. 
IN  1838,  a  carriage  was  built  for  a  gentleman  at  Ken- 
sington, which,  for  completeness,  equalled  Sir  Samuel 
Morland's  celebrated  cooking- carriage,  of  the  seven- 
teenth century.  It  was  divided  into  two  apartments, 
an  anti-room,  and  a  drawing-room  and  bed-chamber 
with  every  comfort.  The  anti-room  contained  a  table, 
drawers,  and  culinary  utensils  ;  and  the  drawing-room 
was  furnished  with  sofas,  sofa-bedstead,  six  chairs, 
table,  cupboards,  and  a  chandelier  for  nine  lights ;  a 
stove  and  fuel.  The  length  of  the  carriage  was  twenty- 
nine  feet,  and  the  breadth  nine  feet ;  and  the  length  of 
the  drawing-room  twenty-feet.  The  whole  weighed 
two  tons  and  a  half. 


ENEMIES  OF  THE  OSTRICH. 

THE  ostrich  would  appear  to  be  a  bird  of  many  enemies, 
from  the  following  statement  in  Sir  J.  E.  Alexander's 
narrative  of  his  Expedition  of  Discovery  in  South 
Africa  : — 


FIRE-PROOF  HOUSE,  PUTNEY  HEATH.  109 

ts  According  to  native  testimony,  the  male  ostrich  sita 
on  the  nest  (which  is  merely  a  hollow  place  scooped 
out  in  the  sand)  during  the  night,  the  better  to  defend 
the  eggs  from  jackals  and  other  nocturnal  plunderers. 
Towards  morning,  he  brummels,  or  utters  a  grumbling 
sound,  for  the  female  to  come  and  take  his  place ;  and 
she  sits  on  the  eggs  during  the  cool  of  the  morning 
and  evening.  In  the  middle  of  the  day,  the  pair, 
leaving  the  eggs  in  charge  of  the  sun,  and  '  forgetting 
that  the  foot  may  crush  them,  or  the  wild  beast  break 
them,'  employ  themselves  in  feeding  off  the  tops  of 
bushes  in  the  plain  near  the  nest.  Looking  aloft  at 
this  time  of  day,  a  white  Egyptian  vulture  may  be 
seen,  soaring  in  mid-air,  with  a  large  stone  between 
his  talons.  Having  carefully  surveyed  the  ground 
below  him,  he  suddenly  lets  fall  the  stone,  and  then 
follows  it  in  rapid  descent.  Let  the  hunter  run  to 
the  spot,  and  he  will  find  a  nest  of,  probably,  a  score 
of  eggs,  (each  equal  in  size  to  twenty-four  hen's  eggs,) 
some  of  them  broken  by  the  vulture.  The  jackal,  too, 
is  said  to  roll  the  egg::  together  to  break  them;  and 
the  hyaena  pushes  them  off  with  his  nose,  io  bury  them 
at  a  distance." 

FIRE-PROOF  HOUSE  ON  PCJTNEY  HEATH. 
UPON  Putney  Heath,  by  the  road-side,  stands  an  obe- 
lisk, to  record  the  success  of  a  discovery  made  in  the 
last  century,  of  the  means  of  building  a  house  which 
no  ordinary  application  of  ignited  combustibles  could 
be  made  to  consume.  The  inventor  was  Mr.  David 
Hartley,  to  whom  the  House  of  Commons  voted  2,500^., 


110       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

to  defray  tbe  expenses  of  the  experimental  building, 
which  stood  about  one  hundred  yards  from  the  obelisk. 
In  1774,  King  George  the  Third  and  Queen  Charlotte 
took  their  breakfast  in  one  of  the  rooms  ;  while  in  the 
apartment  beneath,  fires  were  lighted  on  the  floor,  and 
various  inflammable  materials  were  ignited,  to  attest  that 
the  rooms  above  were  fire-proof.  Hartley's  secret  lay 
in  the  floors  being  double,  and  there  being  interposed 
between  the  two  boards  sheets  of  laminated  iron  and 
copper,  not  thicker  than  tinfoil  or  stout  paper,  which 
rendered  the  floor  air-tight,  and  thereby  intercepted 
the  ascent  of  the  heated  air ;  so  that,  although  the  in- 
ferior boards  were  actually  charred,  the  metal  pre- 
vented the  combustion  taking  place  in  the  upper 
flooring 

Another  experiment  took  place  on  the  110th  an- 
niversary of  the  great  fire  of  London,  when  a  patriotic 
lord  mayor  and  the  corporation  of  London  witnessed 
the  indestructible  property  of  the  structure.  Yet,  the 
invention  was  never  carried  into  further  practice.  The 
house  was,  many  years  after,  converted  into  a  tasteful 
villa,  although  the  obelisk  records  the  success  of  the 
experiment. 

THE  LAST  OF  THE  ALCHEMISTS. 
THE  last  true  believer  in  alchemy  was,  according  to 
Mr.  Brande,  one  Peter  Woulfe,  who  occupied  cham- 
bers in  Barnard's  Inn,  Holborn,  while  in  London,  and 
usually  spent  the  summer  in  Paris.  He  died  in  1805. 
About  the  year  1801,  another  solitary  adept  lived,  or 
rather  starved,  in  London,  in  the  person  of  an  editor 


THE  LAST  OF  THE  ALCHEMISTS.     Ill 

af  an  evening  newspaper,  who  expected  to  compound 
the  alkahest,  if  he  could  keep  his  materials  digested  in 
a  lamp-furnace  for  the  space  of  seven  years.  The 
lamp  burnt  brightly  during  six  years  eleven  months, 
and  some  odd  days  besides ;  and  then,  unluckily,  it 
went  out.  Why  it  went  out,  the  adept  could  never 
guess  ;  but  he  was  certain  that  if  the  flame  could  only 
have  burnt  to  the  end  of  the  septenary  cycle,  his  ex- 
periment must  have  succeeded. 

In  1828,  Sir  Richard  Phillips  visited  "  an  alchemist," 
named  Kellerman,  at  the  village  of  Lilley,  midway 
between  Luton  and  Kitchen  ;  he  was  believed  by  some 
of  his  neighbours  to  have  succeeded  in  discovering  the 
Philosopher's  Stone,  and  also  the  universal  solvent. 
He  had  been  a  man  of  fashion,  and  an  adventurer  on 
the  turf ;  but  had  for  many  years  shut  himself  up  at 
Lilley,  and  been  inaccessible  and  invisible  to  the  world  ; 
his  house  being  barricaded,  and  the  walls  of  his  grounds 
protected  by  hurdles,  with  spring-guns,  so  planted 
as  to  resist  intrusion  in  every  direction.  Sir  Richard, 
however,  obtained  an  interview  with  this  strange 
being,  and  the  account  of  his  visit  is  very  graphic : — 

"  The  front-door  was  opened,  and  Mr.  Kellerman  presented 
liimself.  I  lament  that  I  have  not  the  pencil  of  Hogarth,  for  a 
more  original  figure  never  was  seen.  He  was  about  six  feet 
high,  and  of  athletic  make.  On  his  head  was  a  white  nightcap, 
and  his  dress  consisted  of  a  long  great-coat,  once  green,  and  a 
sort  of  jockey  waistcoat,  with  three  tiejs  of  pockets.  His  man- 
ner was  extremely  polite  and  graceful ;  but  my  attention  was 
chiefly  absorbed  by  his  singular  physiognomy.  His  complexion 
was  deeply  sallow,  and  his  eyes  large,  black,  and  rolling.  He 
conducted  me  into  a  very  large  parlour,  with  a  window  looking 
backward,  and  having  locked  the  door  and  put  the  key  into  his 
pocket,  he  desired  me  to  be  seated  in  one  of  two  large  arm- 


112       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

chairs,  covered  with  sheepskins.  The  room  was  a  realization 
of  the  well-known  picture  of  Teniers's  Alchemist.  The  floor 
was  strewed  with  retorts,  crucibles,  alembics,  jars,  and  bottles  of 
various  shapes,  intermingled  with  old  books,  the  whole  covered 
with  dust  and  cobwebs.  Different  shelves  were  filled  hi  the 
same  manner ;  and  on  one  side  stood  the  Alchemist's  bed.  In  a 
corner,  somewhat  shaded  from  the  light,  I  beheld  two  heads, 
white,  with  dark  wigs  on  them  ;  I  entertained  no  doubt,  there- 
fore, that,  among  other  fancies,  he  was  engaged  hi  re  making 
the  brazen  speaking  head  of  Roger  Bacon  and  Albertus. 

"  He  then  gave  me  a  history  of  his  studies,  mentioned  some 
men  in  London  whom  I  happened  to  know,  and  who,  he  alleged, 
had  assured  him  that  they  had  made  gold.  That  having,  in 
consequence,  examined  the  works  of  the  ancient  alchemists, 
and  discovered  the  key  which  they  had  studiously  concealed 
from  the  multitude,  he  had  pursued  their  system  under  the  in- 
fluence of  new  lights ;  and,  after  suffering  numerous  disappoint- 
ments, owing  to  the  ambiguity  with  which  they  describe  their 
processes,  he  had  at  length  happily  succeeded ;  had  made  gold, 
and  could  make  as  much  more  as  he  pleased,  even  to  the  extent 
of  paying  off  the  national  debt  hi  the  coin  of  the  realm. 

"  I  yielded  to  the  declaration,  expressed  my  satisfaction  at  so 
extraordinary  a  discovery,  and  asked  him  to  show  me  some  of 
the  precious  metal  which  he  had  made. 

"  '  Not  so,"  said  he, « I  will  show  it  to  no  one.  I  made  Lord 
Liverpool  the  offer  that,  if  he  would  introduce  me  to  the  King, 
I  would  show  it  to  his  Majesty;  but  Lord  Liverpool  insolently 
declined,  on  the  ground  that  there  was  no  precedent ;  and  I  am 
therefore  determined  that  the  secret  shall  die  with  me.  It  is 
true  that,  in  order  to  avenge  myself  of  such  contempt,  I  made  a 
communication  to  the  French  ambassador,  Prince  Polignac,  and 
offered  to  go  to  France,  and  transfer  to  the  French  government 
the  entire  advantages  of  the  discovery ;  but,  after  deluding  me, 
and  shuffling  for  some  time,  I  found  it  necessary  to  treat  him 
with  the  same  contempt  as  the  others.  Every  court  in  Europe,' 
he  added,  '  knows  that  I  have  made  the  discovery,  and  they  are 
all  in  a  confederacy  against  me ;  lest,  by  giving  it  to  any  one,  I 
should  make  that  country  master  of  all  the  rest — the  world,  Sir,' 
he  exclaimed  with  great  emotion,  '  is  in  my  hands,  and  my 
power.'  ****«*»* 

"  I  now  inquired  whether  he  had  been  alarmed  by  the  igno- 
rance of  the  people  in  the  country,  so  as  to  shut  himself  up  in 
this  unusual  manner? 


THE  LAST  OF  THE  ALCHEMISTS.    113 

"  '  No,'  he  replied,  '  not  on  their  account  wholly.  They  are 
ignorant  and  insolent  enough ;  but  it  was  to  protect  myself 
against  the  governments  of  Europe,  who  are  determined  to  get 
possession  of  my  secret  by  force.  I  have  been,"  he  exclaimed, 
'  twice  fired  at  through  that  window,  and  three  times  attempted 
to  be  poisoned.  They  believed  I  had  written  a  book  containing 
my  secrets,  and  to  get  possession  of  this  book  has  been  their 
object  To  baffle  them,  I  burnt  all  that  I  had  ever  written ;  and 
I  have  so  guarded  the  windows  with  spring-guns,  and  have  such 
a  collection  of  combustibles  in  the  range  of  bottles  which  stand 
at  your  elbow,  that  I  could  destroy  a  whole  regiment  of  soldiers 
if  sent  against  me.'  He  then  related  that,  as  a  further  protec- 
tion, he  lived  entirely  in  that  room,  and  permitted  no  one  to 
come  into  the  house  ;  while  he  had  locked  up  every  room  except 
that  with  patent  padlocks,  and  sealed  the  keyholes." 

In  a  conversation  of  two  or  three  hours  with  the 
narrator,  Kellerman  enlarged  upon  the  merits  of  the 
ancient  alchemists,  and  on  the  blunders  and  imperti- 
nent assumptions  of  modern  chemists.  He  quoted 
Roger  and  Lord  Bacon,  Paracelsus,  Boyle,  Boerhaave, 
"Woolfe,  and  others,  to  justify  his  pursuits.  As  to  the 
term  philosopher's  stone,  he  alleged  that  it  was  a  mere 
figure  to  deceive  the  vulgar.  He  appeared  to  give 
full  credit  to  the  silly  story  of  Dee's  assistant,  Kelly, 
finding  some  of  the  powder  of  projection  in  the  tomb 
of  Roger  Bacon,  at  Glastonbury,  by  means  of  which, 
as  he  said,  Kelly  for  a  length  of  time  supported  him- 
self in  princely  splendour.  Kellerman  added,  that  he 
had  discovered  the  blacker  than  black  of  Appolonius 
Tyanus :  it  was  itself  "  the  powder  of  projection  for 
producing  gold." 

It  further  appeared  he  had  lived  in  the  premises  at 
Lilley  for  twenty-three  years,  during  fourteen  of 
which  he  had  pursued  his  alchemical  studies  with  un- 
remitting ardour;  keeping  eight  assistants  for  the 
H 


1 14       INVENTION  AND  DISCO  VERY. 

purpose  of  superintending  his  crucibles,  two  at  a  time, 
relieving  each  other  every  six  hours :  that  he  had  ex- 
posed some  preparations  to  intense  heat  for  many 
months  at  a  time,  but  that  all  except  one  crucible  had 
burst — and  that,  Kellerman  said,  contained  the  true 
"  blacker  than  black."  One  of  his  assistants,  however, 
protested  that  no  gold  had  ever  been  found,  and  that 
no  mercury  had  ever  been  fixed,  for  he  was  quite  sure 
Kellerman  could  not  have  concealed  it  from  his  assist- 
ants ;  while,  on  the  contrary,  they  witnessed  his  severe 
disappointment  at  the  result  of  his  most  elaborate  ex- 
periments. 

By  the  way,  in  the  introduction  to  Zanoni,  Sir  E. 
Bulwer  Lytton  has  giveu  a  clever  sketch  of  an 
eccentric  antiquarian  bookseller,  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  Co  vent  Garden,  who  is  said  to  have  assembled  "  the 
most  notable  collection  ever  amassed  by  an  enthusiast, 
of  the  works  of  alchemist,  cabalist,  and  astrologer." 
The  "  vindictive  glare  and  uneasy  vigilance,"  and  the 
frowning  and  groaning  of  the  anti-bookseller  (for  it 
absolutely  went  to  his  heart  when  a  customer  entered 
his  shop),  are  all  very  characteristic  and  life-like  in  this 
sketch.  When  free  from  such  annoyance,  he  might 
be  seen  gloating  over  his  musty,  unsaleable  treasures, 
on  -which  he  had,  it  was  said,  spent  a  fortune. 


CELEBRATED    DIAMONDS. 

WE  read  marvellous  records,  (in  modern  books,  too,) 
of  the  high  prices  realized  for  diamonds;  but  accord- 
ing to  Dr.  Ure,  "  it  does  not  appear  that  any  sum 
exceeding  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  baa 


CELEBRATED  DIAMONDS.  115 

ever  been  given  for  a  diamond."  This  statement, 
made  in  the  year  1820,  has  since  received  signal  con- 
firmation. On  July  20,  1837,  the  Nassuck  diamond 
was  sold  by  auction  in  London,  and  realised  only 
7,200?.,  though  it  was  estimated  by  the  East  India 
Company  to  be  worth  30,000?.  This  diamond  was 
among  the  spoils  which  were  captured  by  the  com- 
bined armies,  under  the  command  of  the  Marquis  of 
Hastings,  in  the  British  conquest  of  India,  and  formed 
part  of  the  "Deccan  booty."  This  magnificent  gem 
is  as  large  as  a  good-sized  walnut,  weighs  357£  grains, 
is  of  dazzling  whiteness,  and  is  as  pure  as  a  drop  of 
dew.  After  the  above  sale,  it  was  purchased  by  the 
Marquis  of  Westminster,  who  more  than  once  wore  it 
on  the  hilt  of  his  court  sword ;  it  was  presented 
by  his  lordship  to  the  Marchioness  of  Westminster, 
on  her  birth-day,  along  with  the  Arcot  diamond 
ear-rings,  once  belonging  to  Queen  Charlotte,  and 
disposed  of  at  the  above  sale  for  11,000?. 

The  Great  Mogul's  diamond,  about  the  size  of  half 
a  hen's  egg,  and  the  Pitt  diamond,  are  well  known. 
Among  the  crown  jewels  of  Russia  is  a  magnificent 
diamond,  weighing  195  carats  :  it  is  the  size  of  a  small 
pigeon's  egg,  and  was  formerly  the  eye  of  a  Brahmin- 
ical  idol,  whence  it  was  purloined  by  a  French  soldier; 
it  passed  through  several  hands,  and  was  ultimately 
purchased  by  the  Empress  Catherine,  for  90,000?. 
in  ready  money,  and  an  annuity  of  4,000?. 

One  of  the  largest  diamonds  in  the  world  was  found 
in  the  river  Abaite,  about  92  miles  N.  W.  of  the  dia- 
mond district  of  Serro  do  Frio,  io  Brazil:  it  is  of 


11C      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

nearly  an  ounce  in  weight,  and  has  been  estimated  by 
Roma  de  1'Isle  at  the  enormous  sum  of  300  millions. 
It  is  uncut ;  but  the  king  of  Portugal,  to  whom  it 
belonged,  had  a  hole  bored  through  it,  in  order  to  wear 
it  suspended  about  his  neck  on  gala  days.  No  sove- 
reign possessed  so  fine  a  collection  of  diamonds  as  this 
prince. 

In  1846,  the  Brazilian  journals  announced  that  a 
negro  had  found,  in  the  diamond  district  of  Bahia,  a 
rough  diamond  weighing  nearly  an  ounce.  The  ap- 
proximative value  was  stated  at  45,000/.,  but  it  was 
sold  by  the  finder  for  35/. 

The  most  celebrated  diamond  of  our  times  we, 
however,  suspect  to  be  that  called  "  The  Mountain  of 
Light/'  (Koh-i-noor,*)  whichbelonged  to  Runjeet  Sing, 
and  now  belongs  to  Queen  Victoria.  It  was  once 
valued  at  £3,000,000,  is  very  brilliant,  and  without  a 
flaw  of  any  kind.  Runjeet's  string  of  pearls  was,  it  is 
thought,  if  possible,  even  handsomer  than  the  diamond; 
they  were  about  three  hundred  in  number,  literally 
the  size  of  small  marbles,  all  picked  pearls,  and  round, 
and  perfect  both  in  shape  and  colour.  Two  hours 
before  he  died,  he  sent  for  all  his  jewels,  and  gave  the 
above  diamond,  said  to  be  the  largest  in  the  world,  to 
a  Hindoo  temple ;  his  celebrated  string  of  pearls  to 
another ;  and  his  favourite  fine  horses,  with  all  their 
jewelled  trappings,  worth  300,000?.,  to  a  third.  "  The 
Nizam's  Diamond  "  is  another  wonderful  gem  :  it  was 
first  seen  in  the  hands  of  a  native  child  in  India,  who 
was  playing  with  it,  ignorant  of  its  value ;  and  a  con- 
siderable sum  being  offered  for  it,  led  to  the  discovery 


DR.  DEE,  THE  NECROMANCER.      117 

of  its  being  a  real  diamond.  In  its  rough  state,  it 
weighs  277  carats ;  and  as  the  rough  stones  are  usually 
taken  to  give  but  half  of  their  weight  when  cut  or 
polished,  it  would  allow  138  carats. 


DR.  DEE,  THE  NECROMANCER. 
DR.  JOHN  DEE  was  a  man  who  made  a  conspicuous 
figure  in  the  16th  century.  He  was  born  in  London 
in  1527 :  he  was  an  eminent  scholar  and  an  inde- 
fatigable mathematician  ;  when  at  Cambridge,  he  was 
mostly  occupied  eighteen  hours  out  of  the  twenty-four 
in  study.  While  here  he  superintended  the  exhibition 
of  a  Greek  play  of  Aristophanes,  among  the  machi- 
nery of  which  he  introduced  an  artificial  scarabaeus, 
or  beetle,  which  flew  up  to  the  palace  of  Jupiter  with 
a  man  on  his  back,  and  a  basket  of  provisions.  The 
astonished  spectators  ascribed  this  feat  to  the  arts  of 
the  magician ;  and  Dee,  annoyed  by  these  suspicions, 
found  it  convenient  to  withdraw  to  the  Continent. 

Dee's  principal  study  in  early  life  lay  in  astrology ; 
and  accordingly,  upon  the  accession  of  Elizabeth, 
Robert  Dudley,  her  chief  favourite,  was  sent  to  con- 
sult the  doctor  as  to  the  aspect  of  the  stars,  that  they 
might  fix  on  an  auspicious  day  for  celebrating  her  coro- 
nation. Some  years  after,  we  find  him  again  on  the 
Continent;  and  in  1571,  being  taken  ill  at  Louvaine, 
the  queen  sent  over  two  physicians  to  attend  him. 
Elizabeth  afterwards  visited  him  at  his  house  at  Mort- 
lake,  to  view  his  collection  of  mathematical  instruments 
and  curiosities  ;  and  about  this  time  employed  him  to 
defend  her  title  to  countries  discovered  in  different 


118       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

parts  of  the  globe.  He  says  of  himself,  that  he  re- 
ceived the  most  advantageous  offers  from  Charles  V., 
Ferdinand,  Maximilian  II.,  and  Rodolph,  emperor  of 
Germany ;  and  from  the  czar  of  Muscovy  an  offer  of 
2000Z.  per  annum,  on  condition  that  he  would  reside 
in  his  dominions.  Had  Dee  gone  no  further  than  this, 
all  would  have  heen  well ;  but  he  was  ruined  by  his 
enthusiasm  ;  he  dreamed  perpetually  of  the  philo- 
sopher's stone,  and  was  haunted  with  the  belief  of  in- 
tercourse with  spirits. 

One  day  in  November,  1582,  he  tells  us  that  as  he 
was  at. prayer,  there  appeared  to  him  the  angel  Uriel 
at  the  west  window  of  his  museum,  who  gave  him  a 
translucent  stone,  or  crystal,  of  a  convex  form,  that 
presented  apparitions,  and  even  emitted  sounds;  so 
that  the  observer  could  hold  conversations,  ask  ques- 
tions, and  receive  answers  from  the  figures  he  saw  in 
this  mirror. 

With  this  speculum,  black-stone,  or  show- stone, 
Dee  used  to  "  call  his  spirits,"  and  Kelly,  his  as- 
sociate, "  did  all  his  feats  upon."  Kelly,  who  acted 
as  seer,  reported  what  spirits  he  saw,  and  what  they 
said;  whilst  Dee,  who  sat  at  a  table,  recorded  the 
spiritual  intelligence.  A  folio  volume  of  their  notes 
was  published  by  Casaubon  ;  and  many  more,  contain- 
ing the  most  unintelligible  jargon,  remain  in  MS.  in 
the  British  Museum,  together  with  the  consecrated 
cakes  of  wax,  marked  with  mathematical  figures  and 
hieroglyphics,  used  in  their  mummeries. 

At  length,  Dee  fell  into  disrepute ;  his  chemical 
apparatus,  and  other  stock  in  trade,  were  destroyed  by 


VOYAGE  OF  MANUFACTURE.        119 

the  mob,  who  made  an  attack  upon  his  house ;  but  the 
mirror  is  stated  to  have  been  saved.  It  subsequently 
passed  into  the  collection  of  the  Mordaunts,  Earls  of 
Peterborough,  in  whose  catalogue  it  is  called  the  black 
stone,  into  which  Dr.  Dee  used  to  call  his  spirits. 
From  the  Mordaunts  it  passed  to  Lady  Elizabeth  Ger- 
maine,  and  from  her  to  John,  Duke  of  Argyle,  whose 
son,  Lord  Frederick  Campbell,  presented  it  to  Horace 
Walpole ;  and  on  the  breaking  up  of  the  collection  at 
Strawberry  Hill  in  1842,  this  precious  relic  was  sold : 
it  was  described  in  the  catalogue  as  "  a  singularly  in- 
teresting and  curious  relic  of  the  superstition  of  our 
ancestors  on  the  celebrated  speculum  of  Kennel  coal, 
highly  polished,  in  a  leathern  case." 

Bulwer,  in  his  romance  of  Zanoni,  introduces  a 
mirror  of  this  kind ;  and  every  tale  of  superstition  has 
its  magic  glass.  It  is  worth  while  to  compare  Dee's 
speculum  with  the  celebrated  ink  mirror  described  in 
Lane's  work  on  the  Modern  Egyptians;  it  may,  at 
least,  illustrate  the  curious  inquiry  upon  coincident 
superstitions. 

VOYAGE  OF  MANUFACTURE. 
THE  produce  of  our  factories  has  preceded  even  our 
most  enterprising  travellers.  Captain  Clapperton  saw 
at  the  court  of  the  Sultan  Bello,  in  the  interior  of 
Africa,  pewter  dishes  with  the  London  stamp,  and  had 
at  the  royal  table  a  piece  of  meat  served  up  on  a  white 
wash-hand  basin  of  English  manufacture.  The  cotton 
of  India  is  conveyed  by  British  ships  round  half  our 
planet,  to  be  woven  by  British  skill  in  the  factories  of 


120       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

Lancashire.  It  is  again  set  in  motion  by  British  capi- 
tal, and  transported  to  the  very  plains  whereon  it  grew ; 
and  is  repurchased  by  the  lords  of  the  soil  which  gave 
it  birth,  at  a  cheaper  price  than  that  at  which  their 
coarser  machinery  enables  them  to  manufacture  it 
themselves.  At  Calicut,  (in  the  East  Indies,)  whence 
the  cotton  cloth  called  calico  derives  its  name,  the 
price  of  labour  is  a  fraction  of  that  in  England,  yet 
the  market  is  supplied  from  British  looms. 


SIR   DAVID    BREWSTER  S    KALEIDOSCOPE. 

THE  idea  of  this  instrument,  constructed  for  the  pur- 
pose of  creating  and  exhibiting  a  variety  of  beautiful 
and  perfectly  symmetrical  forms,  first  occurred  to  Sir 
David  Brewster  in  1814,  when  he  was  engaged  in  ex- 
periments on  the  polarization  of  light,  by  successive 
reflections  between  plates  of  glass.  The  reflectors 
•were,  in  some  instances,  inclined  to  each  other ;  and 
he  had  occasion  to  remark  the  circular  arrangement  of 
the  images  of  a  candle  round  a  centre,  or  the  multipli- 
cation of  the  sectors  formed  by  the  extremities  of  the 
glass  plates.  In  repeating,  at  a  subsequent  period, 
the  experiments  of  M.  Biot  on  the  action  of  fluids 
upon  light,  Sir  David  Brewster  placed  the  fluids  in  a 
trough,  formed  by  two  plates  of  glass,  cemented 
together  at  an  angle ;  and  the  eye  being  necessarily 
placed  at  one  end,  some  of  the  cement,  which  had  been 
pressed  through  between  the  plates,  appeared  to  be 
arranged  into  a  regular  figure.  The  remarkable  sym- 
metry which  it  presented  led  to  Dr.  Brewster's  inves- 


LORD  ROSSES  LEVIATHAN  TELESCOPE.  121 

tigation  of  the  cause  of  this  phenomenon  ;  and  in  so 
doing,  he  discovered  the  leading  principles  of  the 
kaleidoscope. 

By  the  advice  of  his  friends,  Dr.  Brewster  took  out 
a  patent  for  his  invention ;  in  the  specification  of  which 
he  describes  the  kaleidoscope  in  two  different  forms. 
The  instrument,  however,  having  been  shown  to  several 
opticians  in  London,  became  known  before  he  could 
avail  himself  of  his  patent ;  and,  being  simple  in  prin- 
ciple, it  was  at  once  largely  manufactured.  It  is  cal- 
culated that  not  less  than  200,000  kaleidoscopes  were 
sold  in  three  months  in  London  and  Paris ;  though, 
out  of  this  number,  Dr.  Brewster  says,  not,  perhaps, 
one  thousand  were  constructed  upon  scientific  prin- 
ciples, or  were  capable  of  giving  anything  like  a  cor- 
rect idea  of  the  power  of  his  kaleidoscope. 


LORD  EOSSE  S  LEVIATHAN  TELESCOPE. 
THE  late  Earl  of  Rosse,  with  a  devotion  to  science 
•which  has  few  parallels,  constructed  this  gigantic  tele- 
scope, at  his  seat,  Parsonstown,  in  the  south  of  Ire- 
land. To  the  frame  of  the  vast  instrument  is  fixed  a 
large  cubical  wooden  box,  about  eight  feet  wide ;  in 
this  there  is  a  door,  through  which  two  men  go  in  to 
remove,  or  to  replace,  the  cover  of  the  mirror.  To 
this  box  is  fastened  the  tube,  which  is  made  of  deal 
staves,  and  hooped  like  a  huge  cask.  It  is  about  40 
feet  long,  and  8  feet  diameter  in  the  middle.  The 
Dean  of  Ely  once  walked  through  the  tube  with 
an  umbrella  up !  The  stupendous  speculum  weighs 


122       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

three  tons ;  the  casting  and  polishing  of  it  were  la- 
bours of  wonderful  skill.  The  telescope  is  not  turned 
to  any  part  of  the  sky,  but  limited  to  the  range  of 
half  an  hour  on  each  side  of  the  meridian,  through 
which  its  motion  is  given  by  powerful  clockwork, 
independent  of  the  observer.  For  this  purpose  it 
stands  between  two  pieces  of  masonry,  of  gothic  de- 
sign, which  harmonize  with  Lord  Rosse's  castle ;  one 
of  these  piers  sustaining  the  galleries  for  the  observer, 
and  the  second  the  clockwork  and  other  apparatus. 
There  is  an  elegant  arrangement  of  counterpoises  to 
balance  the  enormous  mass,  so  that  a  comparatively 
slight  force  only  is  required  to  elevate  or  depress  it. 
A  correspondent  of  the  Mechanics'  Magazine  thus  de- 
scribes the  capacity  of  this  wonderful  instrument : — 

"  Such  is  its  power,  that  if  a  star  of  the  first  magni- 
tude were  removed  to  such  a  distance,  that  its  light 
would  be  three  millions  of  years  in  reaching  us,  this 
telescope  would,  nevertheless,  show  it  to  the  human 
eye.  Is  it  to  be  wondered  at,  then,  that,  with  such  an 
instrument,  grand  discoveries  should  be  made  ?  It 
has  been  pointed  to  the  heavens ;  and,  although  in  the 
beginning  of  its  career,  it  has  already  accomplished 
mighty  things.  There  are  nebulous  spots  in  the  hea- 
vens which  have  baffled  all  the  instruments  hitherto 
constructed,  but  this  telescope  resolves  their  true  cha- 
racter completely.  Among  the  wonderful  objects 
which  have  been  subject  to  its  scrutiny,  is  the  nebula 
in  the  constellation  of  Orion.  I  have  had  an  opportu- 
nity of  examining  it.  It  is  one  of  the  most  curious 
objects  in  the  whole  heavens.  It  is  not  round,  and  it 


REFLECTING  LIGHTHOUSES.         123 

throws  off  furious  lights.  From  the  time  of  Herschel 
it  has  been  subjected  to  the  examination  of  the  most 
powerful  instruments — but  it  grew  more  and  more 
mysterious  and  diverse  in  its  character.  When  Lord 
Rosse's  great  telescope  was  directed  to  its  examination, 
it  for  a  long  time  resisted  its  power.  He  found  it  re- 
quired patient  examination — night  after  night,  and 
month  after  month.  At  length,  a  pure  atmosphere 
gave  him  the  resolution  of  its  constitution ;  and  the 
stars  of  which  it  is  composed  burst  upon  the  sight  of 
man  for  the  first  time  !" 


ORIGIN  OF  REFLECTING  LIGHTHOUSES. 
IN  the  last  century,  at  a  meeting  of  a  society  of  ma- 
thematicians at  Liverpool,  one  of  the  members  pro- 
posed to  lay  a  wager,  that  he  would  read  a  paragraph 
of  a  newspaper,  at  ten  yards'  distance,  with  the  light 
of  a  farthing  candle.  The  wager  was  laid,  and  the 
proposer,  having  covered  the  inside  of  a  wooden  dish 
with  pieces  of  looking-glass,  fastened  in  with  glaziers' 
putty,  placed  his  reflector  behind  the  candle,  and  won 
his  wager.  One  of  the  company  marked  this  experi- 
ment with  a  philosophic  eye.  This  was  Captain 
Hutchinson,  the  dockmaster,  with  whom  originated 
the  reflecting  lighthouses,  erected  at  Liverpool  in 
1763.  

WASTE 'OF   HUMAN   LIFE. 

IN  1825,  there  was  opened  in  Cochin-China  a  canal, 
23  miles  long,  80  feet  wide,  and  12  feet  deep.  It  was 
begun  and  finished  in  six  weeks,  although  carried 


124       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

through  large  forests  and  over  extensive  marshes, 
Twenty  thousand  men  worked  upon  it  day  and  night; 
and  it  is  stated  that  7,000  died  of  fatigue. 


LIFTING    HEAVY    PERSONS . 

ONE  of  the  most  extraordinary  pages  in  Sir  David 
Brewster's  Letters  on  Natural  Magic,  is  the  experiment 
in  which  a  heavy  man  is  raised  with  the  greatest  faci- 
lity, when  he  is  lifted  up  the  instant  that  his  own 
lungs,  and  those  of  the  persons  who  raise  him,  are 
inflated  with  air.  Thus,  the  heaviest  person  in  the 
party  lies  down  upon  two  chairs,  his  legs  being  sup- 
ported by  the  one,  and  his  back  by  the  other.  Four 
persons,  one  at  each  leg,  and  one  at  each  shoulder,  then 
try  to  raise  him — the  person  to  be  raised  giving  two 
signals,  by  clapping  his  hands.  At  the  first  signal,  he 
himself  and  the  four  lifters  begin  to  draw  a  long  and 
full  breath,  and  when  the  inhalation  is  completed,  or 
the  lungs  filled,  the  second  signal  is  given  for  raising 
the  person  from  the  chair.  To  his  own  surprise,  and 
that  of  his  bearers,  he  rises  with  the  greatest  facility, 
as  if  he  were  no  heavier  than  a  feather !  Sir  David 
Brewster  states  that  he  has  seen  this  inexplicable  ex- 
periment performed  more  than  once ;  and  he  appeals 
for  testimony  to  Sir  Walter  Scott,  who  had  repeat- 
edly seen  the  experiment,  and  performed  the  part,  both 
of  the  load  and  of  the  bearer.  It  was  first  shown  in 
England  by  a  gentleman  who  saw  it  performed  in  a 
large  party  at  Venice,  under  the  direction  of  an 
officer  of  the  American  navy. 


ORIGIN  OF  THE  SOCIETY  OF  ARTS.  125 

ORIGIN  OF  THE  SOCIETY  OF  ARTS. 
"  To  this  Society,"  a  well-informed  writer  has  said, 
"  some  of  our  best  artists  have  owed  the  most  priceless 
of  all  services  that  can  be  rendered  to  men  of  genius  at 
the  outset  of  their  career — appreciation  on  the  part  of 
an  enlightened  few — introduction  under  favourable 
auspices  to  the  many." 

The  Society  of  Arts  was  established  in  1754,  chiefly 
by  Mr.  William  Shipley,  a  drawing-master ;  but  it 
was  not  until  1774  that  the  institution  was  fairly 
located  in  its  own  premises,  built  in  handsome  style 
by  the  Adams',  in  John  Street,  Adelphi ;  the  object 
being  denoted  by  the  inscription  upon  the  entablature 
of  the  pediment  in  the  front  of  the  mansion,  in  these 
words :  "  Arts  and  Commerce  promoted." 

There  are  many  interesting  anecdotes  of  the  early 
awards  of  this  Society.  Thus,  in  1758,  Bacon,  the 
sculptor,  received  for  a  small  figure  of  Peace  a  reward 
of  ten  guineas  ;  and  the  same  artist  gained  the  highest 
premium  upon  nine  different  occasions.  In  1761, 
Nollekens  received  ten  guineas  for  an  alto-relievo  of 
Jephtha's  Vow ;  and  two  years  later,  fifty  guineas  for 
a  more  important  piece  of  sculpture.  Flaxman,  in 
1768,  gained  for  one  of  his  earliest  attempts  a  grant 
often  guineas  ;  and  for  another  work,  in  1771,  he  ob- 
tained the  Society's  gold  medal.  Lawrence,  at  the 
early  age  of  thirteen,  received  the  reward  of  a  silver- 
gilt  palette,  with  five  guineas,  for  his  drawing  in 
crayons  of  the  Transfiguration  ;  and  the  painter  in  the 
height  of  his  subsequent  prosperity,  was  accustomed 


126       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

to  speak  of  the  impulse  thus  given  to  his  love  of  art. 
In  1807,  Sir  William  Ross,  at  the  age  of  twelve,  re- 
ceived the  Society's  silver  palette  for  a  drawing  of  the 
death  of  Wat  Tyler ;  Mr.  Edwin  Landseer  gained  a 
similar  mark  of  approbation  in  1810,  for  an  etching; 
and  to  Mr.  Wyon  was  adjudged  the  gold  medal,  in 
1818,  for  a  medal  die.  But  to  artists  there  is  a  fea- 
ture of  still  greater  interest  in  the  Society's  history : 
it  was  in  its  rooms  that  the  first  exhibition  of  paintings 
in  England  took  place  in  1760,  which  was  continued 
with  great  success  for  some  years. 

Within  about  ninety  years,  the  Society  had  distri- 
buted more  than  100,OOOZ.  in  premiums.  The  growth 
of  forest  trees  was  one  of  its  early  objects  of  encourage- 
ment ;  and  we  find  among  the  recipients  of  its  gold 
medals  the  Dukes  of  Bedford  and  Beaufort,  the  Earls 
of  Winterton,  Upper  Ossory,  and  Mansfield ;  and  Dr. 
Watson,  Bishop  of  Llandaff.  Then  came  agriculture, 
chemistry,  manufactures,  and  mechanics.  In  the  latter, 
the  Society  taught  us,  or  at  least  aided  those  who  did 
so,  the  manufacture  of  Turkey  carpet,  tapestry,  weav- 
ing, and  weaving  to  imitate  the  Marseilles  and  India 
quilting  ;  also,  how  to  improve  our  spinning  and  lace- 
making,  our  paper,  and  our  catgut  for  musical  instru- 
ments, our  straw-bonnets,  and  artificial  flowers. 

The  colonies  shared  in  the  Society's  early  en- 
couragement: potash  and  pearlash  were  produced 
by  its  agent  in  North  America ;  and  it  was  busily 
engaged,  just  before  the  breaking  out  of  the  war  of 
independence,  in  introducing  the  culture  of  the  vine, 
th«  growth  of  silk-worms,  and  the  manufacture  of 


VAST  MIRRORS.  127 

indigo  and  vegetable  oils.  But  the  rewards  given  to 
poor  Bethnal-green  and  Spitalfields  weavers,  for  use- 
ful inventions  in  their  calling,  illustrate,  perhaps  even 
better  than  any  of  the  foregoing  instances,  the  object 
of  the  Society  which  so  honourably  distinguishes  it 
from  other  associations — its  readiness  to  receive,  exa- 
mine, and  reward  every  kind  of  useful  invention  that 
may  be  brought  forward  by  those  who  have  neither 
friends  nor  money  to  aid  them  in  making  their  inven- 
tions known. 

Nor  must  we  forget  Barry's  grand  series  of  paint" 
ings  upon  the  Society's  large  room ;  of  which  Dr. 
Johnson  said,  "  there  is  a  grasp  of  mind  there,  which 
you  will  find  nowhere  else."  Upon  the  walls,  too, 
hang  some  fine  portraits  of  the  early  presidents  of  the 
Society,  painted  by  Sir  Joshua  Keynolds. 

VAST    MIRRORS. 

MIRRORS  are  cast  of  larger  dimensions  at  St.  Pe- 
tersburg than  elsewhere.  In  the  imperial  manufac- 
tory, there  was  cast  for  Prince  Potemkin,  a  mirror 
measuring  194  inches  by  100.  One  of  the  same  pro- 
portions, valued  at  3000  guineas,  was  cast  for  the  Duke 
of  Wellington  many  years  since,  but  was  broken  to 
atoms  in  its  conveyance  from  St.  Petersburg  to  England. 

TRANSPORTATION    OF    THE    COFFEE-TREE. 
ONE  of  the  most  interesting  episodes  in  the  history  of 
coffee  is,  that  of  the  transportation  of  the  plant  of  the 
coffee-tree,  taken  from  the  hothouses  of  Amsterdam, 
given  to  Louis  XIV.,  and  father  of  the  three  plantS| 


128       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

one  of  which  was  taken  to  the  French  Antilles  by 
Captain  Declieux,  who,  in  a  scarcity  of  water  expe- 
rienced by  the  ship's  crew,  shared  the  small  quantity 
which  he  had  to  drink,  between  himself  and  his  dear 
coffee-plant.  It  is  believed  that  from  this  plant  has 
sprung  all  the  coffee  grown  in  the  West  Indies. 


ARKWRIGHT'S  SPINNING  FRAME. 

MR.  AEKWRIGHT  tells  us,  that  he  accidentally  derived 
the  first  hint  of  this  great  invention  from  seeing  a  red- 
hot  iron  bar  elongated  by  being  made  to  pass  between 
rollers ;  and,  though  there  is  no  mechanical  analogy  be- 
tween that  operation  and  the  process  of  spinning,  it  is 
not  difficult  to  imagine  that,  by  reflecting  upon  it,  and 
placing  the  subject  in  different  points  of  view,  it  might 
lead  him  to  his  invention. 

SPINNING   FEATS. 

AMONG  the  wonders  of  this  branch  of  manufacture, 
the  following  deserve  mention : — In  1745,  a  woman  at 
East  Dereham,  in  Norfolk,  spun  a  single  pound  of 
wool  into  a  thread  of  84,000  yards  in  length,  wanting 
only  80  yards  of  forty-eight  miles,  which,  at  the  above 
period,  was  considered  a  circumstance  of  sufficient 
curiosity  to  merit  a  place  in  the  records  of  the  Royal 
Society.  Since  that  time,  however,  a  young  lady  of 
Norwich  has  spun  a  pound  of  combed  wool  into  a 
thread  of  168,000  yards;  and  she  actually  produced 
from  the  same  weight  of  cotton  a  thread  of  203,000 
yards,  equal  to  upwards  of  115  miles : — this  last  thread, 
if  woven,  would  produce  about  twenty  yards  of  yard- 
wide  muslin. 


MARVELS  OF  THE  ALCHEMISTS.     129 

MARVELS  OF  THE  ALCHEMISTS. 
THE  pretended  secret  of  the  Alchemists  was  the  trans- 
mutation of  the  baser  metals  into  gold,  which  they  oc- 
casionally exhibited  to  keep  the  dupes  who  supplied 
them  with  money  in  good  spirits.  This  they  performed 
in  various  ways.  Sometimes  they  made  use  of  cruci- 
bles with  a  false  bottom.  At  the  real  bottom,  they  put 
a  quantity  of  gold  or  silver.  This  was  covered  by  a 
portion  of  powdered  crucible  mixed  with  gum  or  wax, 
and  hardened.  The  material  being  put  into  a  crucible 
and  the  heat  applied,  the  false  bottom  disappeared ;  and 
at  the  end  of  the  process,  the  gold  or  silver  was  found 
at  the  bottom  of  the  crucible.  Sometimes,  they  made 
a  hole  in  a  piece  of  charcoal,  filled  it  with  oxide  of  gold 
or  silver,  and  stopped  up  the  hole  with  a  little  wax ;  or 
they  soaked  the  charcoal  in  solutions  of  these  metals ; 
or  they  stirred  the  mixture  in  the  crucible  with  hollow 
rods,  containing  oxide  of  gold  or  silver  within,  and  the 
end  closed  with  wax.  By  these  means,  the  gold  or 
silver  wanted  was  introduced  during  the  operation, 
and  considered  as  a  product. 

Sometimes  the  cunning  wights  used  solutions  of 
silver  in  nitric  acid,  or  of  gold  in  aqua-regia,  or  an 
amalgam  of  gold  or  silver,  which  being  adroitly  intro- 
duced, furnished  the  requisite  quantity  of  metal.  A 
common  exhibition  was  to  dip  nails  into  a  liquid,  and 
take  them  out,  half  converted  into  gold.  The  nails 
were  one-half  gold  and  the  other  half  iron,  neatly  sol- 
dered together,  and  the  gold  was  covered  with  some- 
thing to  conceal  the  colour,  which  the  liquid  was  capa- 
ble of  removing. 


130       INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

INVENTION    OF   THE    HAND  GEAR. 

Ir  has  been  said  that  we  are  indebted  for  the  im- 
portant invention  in  the  steam-engine,  termed  hand 
gear,  by  which  its  valves  or  cocks  are  worked  by  the 
machine  itself,  to  an  idle  boy  named  Humphrey  Pot- 
ter, who,  being  employed  to  stop  and  open  a  valve, 
saw  that  he  could  save  himself  the  trouble  of  attending 
and  watching  it,  by  fixing  a  plug  upon  a  part  of  the 
machine  which  came  to  the  place  at  the  proper  times, 
in  consequence  of  the  general  movement.  If  this 
anecdote  be  true,  what  does  it  prove  ?  That  Hum- 
phrey Potter  might  be  very  idle,  but  that  he  was,  at 
the  same  time,  very  ingenious.  It  was  a  contrivance, 
not  the  result  of  accident,  but  of  acute  observation 
and  successful  experiment. — Dr.  Paris. 


POKER   ACROSS    THE    FIRE. 

BOSWELL  and  Johnson  held  a  conversation  upon  this 
experiment  as  follows: — BosweU.  "Why,  sir,  do 
people  play  this  trick,  which  I  observe  now  when  I 
look  at  your  grate,  putting  the  shovel  against  it  to 
make  the  fire  burn  ?" — Johnson.  "  They  play  the 
trick,  but  it  does  not  make  the  fire  burn.  There  is  a 
better  (setting  the  poker  perpendicularly  up  at  right 
angles  with  the  grate.)  In  days  of  superstition,  they 
thought,  as  it  made  a  cross  with  the  bars,  it  would 
drive  away  the  witch." 

Upon  this,  Dr.  Kearney  notes  :  "  it  certainly  does 
make  the  fire  burn :  by  repelling  the  air,  it  throws 
a  blast  upon  the  fire,  and  so  performs  the  parts,  in  some 


ARTESIAN  WELL  OF  CRENELLE.     131 

degree,  of  a  blower  or  bellows."  These  observations 
were  made  only  as  to  the  shovel,  but  the  poker  is 
equally  efficacious.  "  After  all,"  says  Croker,  "  it  is 
possible  that  there  may  be  some  magnetic  or  electrical 
influence,  which,  in  the  progress  of  science,  may  be 
explained ;  and  what  has  been  thought  a  vulgar  trick, 
may  be  proved  to  be  a  philosophical  experiment." 

Whatever  may  be  the  cause,  there  is  every-day  evi- 
dence that  a  poker  or  shovel,  as  the  case  may  be,  if 
laid  across  a  dull  fire,  will  revive  it ;  because,  we 
think,  the  poker  or  shovel  receives  and  concentrates 
the  heat,  and  produces  an  additional  draught  through 
the  fire.  

THE  ARTESIAN  WELL  OF  GRENELLE,  AT  PARIS. 
THE  boring  of  this  well  by  the  Messrs.  Mulct  occu- 
pied seven  years,  one  month,  twenty-six  days,  to  the 
depth  of  1794£  English  feet,  or  194£  feet  below  the 
depth  at  which  M.  Elie  de  Beaumont  foretold  that 
water  would  be  found.  The  sound,  or  borer,  weighed 
20,000  lb.,  and  was  treble  the  height  of  that  of  the 
dome  of  the  Hospital  des  Invalides,  at  Paris.  In  May, 
1837,  when  the  bore  had  reached  1246  feet  8  inches, 
the  great  chisel  and  262  feet  of  rods  fell  to  the  bottom; 
and,  although  these  weighed  five  tons,  M.  Mulct 
tapped  a  screw  on  the  head  of  the  rods,  and  thus,  con- 
necting another  length  to  them,  after  fifteen  months' 
labour,  drew  up  the  chisel !  On  another  occasion, 
this  chisel  having  been  raised  with  great  force,  sunk 
at  one  stroke  85  feet  3  inches  into  the  chalk  !  * 
*  The  depth  of  the  Grenelle  Well  is  nearly  four  times  the 


182       IN  VENTION  AND  DISCO  VERY, 

''  WET   THE    ROPES." 

THE  property  of  cords  contracting  their  length  by 
moisture  became  generally  known,  it  is  said,  on  the 
raising  of  the  Egyptain  obelisk  in  the  square  facing 
St.  Peter's,  at  Rome,  by  order  of  Pope  Sixtus  V.  The 
great  work  was  undertaken  in  the  year  1586,  and  the 
day  for  raising  the  obelisk  was  marked  with  great 
solemnity.  High  mass  was  celebrated  at  St.  Peter's, 
and  the  architect  and  workmen  received  the  benedic- 
tion of  the  Pope.  The  blast  of  a  trumpet  was  the 
given  signal,  when  engines  were  set  in  motion  by  an 
incredible  number  of  horses;  but  not  until  after  fifty- 
two  unsuccessful  attempts  had  been  made,  was  the 
huge  block  lifted  from  the  earth.  As  the  ropes  which 
held  it  had  somewhat  stretched,  the  base  of  the  obelisk 
could  not  reach  the  summit  of  the  pedestal,  when  a 
man  in  the  crowd  cried  out,  "  Wet  the  ropes  /"  This 
advice  was  followed,  and  the  column,  as  of  itself, 
gradually  rose  to  the  required  height,  and  was  placed 
upright  on  the  pedestal  prepared  for  it. 

height  of  Strasburg  Cathedral ;  more  than  six  times  the  height 
of  the  Hospital  des  lavalides,  at  Paris  ;  more  than  four  times 
the  height  of  St.  Peter's,  at  Eome ;  nearly  four  times  and 
a  half  the  height  of  St.  Paul's,  and  nine  times  the  height  of  the 
Monument,  London.  Lastly,  suppose  all  the  above  edifices  to 
be  piled  upon  each  other,  from  the  base-line  of  the  AVell  of 
Grenelle,  and  they  would  but  reach  within  114  feet  of  its  our-, 
face.—  Year-Book  of  Fuels,  1343. 


THE  DEATH  OF  DR.  BLACK.         133 


THE  DEATH  OF  DE.  BLACK. 

IN  the  society  of  friends  sucli  as  Adam  Smith,  Hume, 
Carlyle,  Home,  Hutton,  Playfair,  and  Dugald  Stewart, 
the  closing  days  of  this  great  and  gentle  chemist  wore 
tranquilly  away.  Towards  the  end,  he  sank  into  a 
low  state  of  health,  and  only  preserved  himself  from 
the  severe  shocks  of  the  weather  in  the  changeable 
climate  of  Edinburgh,  by  a  degree  of  care  and  abste- 
miousness rarely  surpassed  even  by  the  devoutest 
Brahmin.  "  It  was  his  generous  and  manly  wish, 
that  he  might  never  live  to  be  a  burden  to  his  friends; 
and  never  was  the  wish  more  completely  gratified. 
On  the  26th  November  1799,  in  the  seventy-first 
year  of  his  age,  he  expired  without  any  convulsion, 
shock,  or  stupor,  to  announce  or  retard  the  approach 
of  death.  Being  at  table  with  his  usual  fare — some 
bread,  a  few  prunes,  and  a  measured  quantity  of  milk 
diluted  with  water  ;  and  having  the  cup  in  his  hand 
when  the  last  stroke  of  the  pulse  was  to  be  given,  he 
had  set  it  down  upon  his  knees,  which  were  joined 
together,  and  kept  it  steady  with  his  hand  in  the 
manner  of  a  person  perfectly  at  ease ;  and  in  this 
attitude  expired,  without  spilling  a  drop,  and  without 
a  writhe  in  his  countenance  ;  as  if  an  experiment  had 
been  required,  to  show  to  his  friends  the  facility  with 
which  he  departed.  His  servant  opened  the  door  to 
tell  him  that  some  one  had  left  his  name  ;  but  getting 
no  answer,  stepped  about  half  way  towards  him,  and, 
seeing  him  sitting  in  that  easy  posture,  supporting 


134      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

his  basin  of  milk  with  one  hand,  he  thought  that  he 
had  dropped  asleep,  which  he  had  sometimes  seen 
happen  after  his  meals.  The  man  went  back  and 
shut  the  door ;  but  before  he  got  down  stairs,  some 
anxiety  that  he  could  not  account  for  made  him  re- 
turn, and  look  again  at  his  master.  Even  then,  he 
was  satisfied,  after  coming  pretty  near,  and  turned 
to  go  away ;  but  again  returned,  and  coming  quite 
close,  found  his  master  without  life." 


ORIGIN  OF  THE  TELEGRAPH. 

WHEN  Arthur  Young  made  his  well-known  journey 
in  France,  in  the  year  1787  to  1789,  he  met,  he  tells 
us,  with  a  Monsieur  Lomond,  "  a  very  ingenious  and 
inventing  mechanic,"  who  had  made  a  remarkable 
discovery  in  electricity.  "You  write  two  or  three 
words  on  a  paper,"  says  Young :  "  he  takes  it  with 
him  into  a  room,  and  turns  a  machine  enclosed  hi  a 
cylindrical  case,  at  the  top  of  which  is  an  electrometer, 
a  small,  fine,  pith  ball ;  a  wire  connects  with  a  simi- 
lar cylinder  and  electrometer  in  a  distant  apartment ; 
and  his  wife,  by  remarking  the  corresponding  mo- 
tions of  the  ball,  writes  down  the  words  they  indi- 
cate ;  from  which  it  appears  that  he  has  formed  an 
alphabet  of  motions.  As  the  length  of  the  wire 
makes  no  difference  in  the  effect,  a  correspondence 
might  be  carried  on  at  any  distance.  Whatever  the 
use  may  be,  the  invention  is  beautiful."  This  dis- 
covery, however,  lay  unnoticed  until  about  the  year 
1845  ;  though  the  apparatus  was  designed  to  effect 


ORIGIN  OF  THE  TELEGRAPH.        13 

the  same  end  as  the  electric  telegraph,  by  means 
very  similar. 

The  possibility  of  applying  electricity  to  telegraphic 
communication  was  conceived  by  several  other  per- 
sons, long  before  it  was  attempted  upon  a  practical 
scale.  The  Eev.  Mr.  Gamble,  in  his  description  of 
his  original  shutter-telegraph,  published  towards  the 
close  of  the  last  century,  alludes  to  a  project  of  elec- 
trical communication.  Mr.  Francis  Eonalds,  in  a 
pamphlet  on  this  subject,  published  in  1823,  states 
that  Cavallo  proposed  to  convey  intelligence  by  pass- 
ing given  numbers  of  sparks  through  an  insulated 
wire ;  and  that,  in  1816,  he  himself  made  experi- 
ments upon  this  principle,  which  he  deemed  more 
promising  than  the  application  of  galvanic  or  voltaic 
electricity,  which  had  been  projected  by  some  Ger- 
mans and  Americans.  He  succeeded  perfectly  in 
transmitting  signals  through  a  length  of  eight  miles 
of  insulated  wire ;  and  he  describes  minutely  the  con- 
trivances necessary  for  adapting  the  principle  to  tele- 
graphic communication. 

It  is,  however,  to  the  combined  labours  of  Mr.  TV". 
F.  Cooke  and  Professor  Wheatstone  that  electric 
telegraphs  owe  then1  practical  application ;  and,  in  a 
statement  of  the  facts  respecting  their  relative  posi- 
tions in  connection  with  the  invention,  drawn  up  at 
their  request  by  Sir  M.  I.  Brunei  and  Professor 
Daniell,  it  is  observed  that  "  Mr.  Cooke  is  entitled  to 
stand  alone,  as  the  gentleman  to  whom  this  country 
is  indebted  for  having  practically  introduced  and 
carried  out  the  electric  telegraph  as  a  useful  under- 


136      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

taking,  promising  to  be  a  work  of  national  import- 
ance ;  and  Professor  Wheatstone  is  acknowledged  aa 
the  scientific  man  whose  profound  and  successful  re- 
searches had  already  prepared  the  public  to  receive  it 
as  a  project  capable  of  practical  application." — Penny 
Cyclopaedia. 


NECESSITY  THE  MOTHER  OF  INVENTION. 

WHEN  Yitigcs,  king  of  the  Goths,  besieged  Belisarius 
in  Rome  in  536,  and  caused  the  fourteen  large  aque- 
ducts to  be  stopped,  the  city  was  subjected  to  great 
distress,  not  on  account  of  the  want  of  water  in  gene- 
ral, for  it  was  secured  against  that  inconvenience  by 
the  Tiber,  but  on  account  of  the  loss  of  that  water 
which  the  baths  required,  and,  above  all,  of  that 
necessary  to  drive  the  mills,  which  were  all  situated 
on  these  canals.  Horses  and  cattle,  which  might 
have  been  employed  in  grinding,  were  not  to  be 
found  ;  but  Belisarius,  a  man  of  great  ingenuity,  de- 
vised an  expedient  to  remedy  this  distress.  Below 
the  bridge  that  reached  to  the  wall  of  Janiculum,  ho 
extended  ropes,  well  fastened,  and  stretched  across 
the  river  from  both  banks.  To  these  he  affixed  two 
boats  of  equal  size,  at  the  distance  of  two  feet  from 
each  other,  where  the  current  flowed  with  the  greatest 
rapidity,  under  the  arch  of  the  bridge ;  and,  placing 
large  millstones  on  one  of  the  boats,  suspended  in  the 
middle  space  a  machine  by  which  they  were  turned. 
He  constructed  at  certain  intervals  on  the  river  other 
machines  of  the  same  description,  which,  being  put 


A  "  DRY-MAKING  "  IN  HOLLAND.     137 

in  motion  by  the  force  of  the  water  that  ran  below 
them,  drove  as  many  mills  as  were  necessary  to  grind 
provisions  for  the  city.  To  destroy  these,  the  be- 
siegers threw  into  the  stream  logs  of  wood,  and  dead 
bodies,  which  floated  down  the  river  into  the  city ; 
but  the  besieged,  by  making  use  of  booms  to  stop 
them,  were  enabled  to  drag  them  out  before  they  did 
any  mischief.  This  is  said  to  have  been  the  first  in- 
vention of  floating  mills. 


A  "DRY-MAKING"  IN  HOLLAND. 

THE  conversion  into  solid  land  of  the  Lake  of  Beem- 
stei,  in  North  Holland,  is,  after  the  Haarlemmermeer 
Polder  (which  is  twice  and  a  half  its  size),  the  largest 
specimen  in  the  Netherlands  of  what  the  Dutch  term 
"  dry-makings."  The  scheme  was  first  broached  in 
1570.  In  1592  funds  were  applied  for,  which  were 
not,  however,  promised  by  the  States  of  Holland  and 
West  Friesland  until  1597.  In  1607,  a  company  was 
formed  at  the  Hague,  by  Dirck  van  Oss  and  others, 
to  pump  out  the  Beemster  in  whole  or  in  part ;  and 
on  their  security  the  States  lent  the  necessary  capital. 
At  the  commencement,  it  was  thought  that  sixteen 
windmills  would  suffice  for  the  undertaking  ;  but  this 
number  was  shortly  increased  by  ten,  and  the  twenty- 
six  mills  were  then  divided  into  thirteen  gangs.  By 
the  end  of  1608,  several  of  the  mills  began  to  pump, 
and  early  in  1609,  they  were  all  ready.  Towards  the 
end  of  this  year,  the  bottom  of  the  lake  became  visible 
in  some  places :  but  during  a  storm  on  the  23d  of 


138      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

January  1610,  the  great  waterland  sea  dyke  gave 
way,  and  the  pressure  on  the  ring  dyke  that  had  been 
constructed  round  the  Beemster  proved  greater  than 
it  was  capable  of  resisting.  It  gave  way  in  turn  in 
two  places,  and  the  lake  was  again  filled.  On  the 
5th  February  1610,  further  and  ample  funds  were 
advanced  by  the  States;  in  161 1,  more  mills  were 
put  on  to  the  work ;  on  the  19th  of  May  1612,  the 
dry-making  was  at  last  completed  ;  and  on  the  30th 
July  of  that  year,  the  distribution  of  the  lots  of  land 
redeemed  took  place.  The  ring  dyke  is  over  37,000 
yards  long,  and  has  an  average  height  of  x  1'50 
Z.  P.  (a  metre  and  a  half  above  the  mean  level  of 
the  sea).  Thus  was  the  Beemster  pumped  out ;  and 
from  that  day  to  the  present,  the  name  of  Dirck  van 
Oss  has  been  held  in  deep  respect  in  Holland,  as  the 
name  of  the  first  Dutchman  who  conquered  the 
waters  on  anything  like  a  large  scale.  The  system 
he  employed  has  been  closely  followed  in  all  suc- 
cessive undertakings  of  this  kind  ;  and,  with  the  ex- 
ception of  the  application  of  steam,  and  certain  im- 
provements in  machinery,  the  plans  of  Dirck  van  O.~s 
for  draining  the  Beemster  were  adapted  with  a  like 
success  to  the  Lake  of  Haarlem,  by  M.  Gevers  d'Ende- 
geest,  the  hero  of  this  last  conquest,  and  the  sanguine 
prophet  (1867)  of  the  ultimate  reclamation  of  the 
Zuyder  Zee.  The  drainage  of  the  Lake  of  Haarlem, 
it  may  be  mentioned,  was  accomplished  in  1852, 
after  thirteen  years  of  toil  and  anxiety,  at  a  cost  of 
11,000,000  florins  (£916,666)  ;  a  sum  which,  large  as 
it  is,  has  nevertheless  been  completely  recovered, 


A  SCIENTIFIC  PILGRIM.  139 

both  in  capital  and  interest,  by  the  sale  of  42,481 
acres  of  arable  land. — Report  to  Foreign  Office. 


A  SCIENTIFIC  PILGRIM. 

WHEN  Lord  Napier  (of  Merchiston)  first  published 
his  Logarithms,  Mr.  Briggs,  Professor  of  Mathematics 
at  Gresham  College,  London,  \vas  so  surprised  with 
admiration,  that  he  could  not  rest  till  he  had  seen 
the  noble  inventor,  and  actually  went  to  Scotland  for 
that  purpose  in  1615.  Lilly,  the  astrologer,  thus 
describes  the  interview  : — "  Mr.  Briggs  appointed  a 
certain  day  when  to  meet  at  Edinburgh  ;  but,  failing 
thereof,  Merchiston  was  afraid  he  would  not  come. 
It  happened  one  day,  as  John  Marr  and  the  Lord 
Napier  were  speaking  of  Mr.  Briggs  :  '  Ah !  John,' 
said  Merchiston,  '  Mr.  Briggs  will  not  come.'  At  the 
very  instant,  one  knocks  at  the  gate ;  John  Man- 
hastens  down,  and  it  proved  to  be  Mr.  Briggs,  to  his 
great  contentment ;  he  brings  Mr.  Briggs  up  into  my 
Lord's  chamber,  where  almost  one  quarter  of  an  hour 
was  spent,  each  beholding  the  other  with  admiration 
before  one  word  was  spoken.  At  last,  Mr.  Briggs 
began,  'My  Lord,  I  have  undertaken  this  long  jour- 
ney purposely  to  see  your  person,  and  to  know  by 
what  engine  of  wit  or  ingenuity  you  came  first  to 
think  of  this  most  excellent  help  unto  astronomy, 
viz.  the  logarithms ;  but,  my  Lord,  being  by  you 
found  out,  I  wonder  nobody  else  found  it  out  before, 
when  now,  being  known,  it  appears  so  easy.' " 
Briggs  was  nobly  entertained  by  Lord  Napier ;  and 


140      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

every  summer  after,  during  his  lordship's  life,  thia 
venerable  man  went  to  Scotland  purposely  to  sea 
him. 


THE  BURNING  MIRRORS  OF  ARCHIMEDES. 

MAXY  have  questioned  the  facts  recorded  by  several 
historians,  concerning  the  surprising  effects  of  the 
burning  mirrors  of  Archimedes,  by  means  of  which 
the  Roman  galleys  besieging  Syracuse  were  consumed 
to  ashes.  Descartes,  in  particular,  discredited  the 
story  as  fabulous  ;  but  Kircher  made  many  experi- 
ments with  a  view  of  testing  its  credibility.  He  tried 
the  effect  of  a  number  of  plane  mirrors ;  and,  with 
five  mirrors  of  the  same  size,  placed  in  a  frame,  he 
contrived  to  throw  the  rays  reflected  from  them  to 
the  same  spot,  at  the  distance  of  more  than  100  feet ; 
and  by  this  means  he  produced  such  a  degree  of  heat, 
as  led  him  to  conclude  that,  by  increasing  their 
number,  he  could  have  set  fire  to  inflammable  sub- 
stances at  a  greater  distance.  He  likewise  made  a 
voyage  to  Syracuse,  in  company  with  his  pupil 
Schottius,  in  order  to  examine  the  place  of  the  al- 
leged transaction ;  and  they  were  both  of  opinion, 
that  the  galleys  of  Marcellus  could  not  have  been 
more  than  thirty  paces  from  Archimedes'  mirrors. 

M.  Buffon  also  constructed  a  machine,  consisting 
of  a  number  of  mirrors,  by  which  he  seems  to  have 
revived  the  secret  of  Archimedes,  and  to  have  vindi- 
cated the  credit  of  history  in  this  respect.  His  ex- 
periment was  first  made  with  twenty-four  mirrors, 


ARCHIMEDES'  MIRRORS.  141 

which  readily  set  fire  to  combustible  matter  composed 
of  pitch  and  tow,  and  laid  on  a  deal  board  at  the 
distance  of  seventy-two  feet.  He  further  pursued 
the  attempt  by  framing  a  kind  of  polyhedron,  consist- 
ing of  168  pieces  of  plane  looking-glass,  each  six 
inches  square ;  and  by  means  of  this  machine,  some 
boards  of  beech-wood  were  set  on  fire  at  the  distance 
of  150  feet,  and  a  silver  plate  was  melted  at  the  dis- 
tance of  60  feet.  This  machine,  in  the  next  stage  of 
its  improvement,  contained  360  plane  mirrors,  each 
eight  inches  long  and  six  broad,  mounted  on  a  frame 
eight  feet  high  and  seven  broad.  With  twelve  of 
these  mirrors,  light  combustible  matter  was  kindled 
at  the  distance  of  twenty  feet ;  with  forty-five  of 
them,  at  the  same  distance,  a  large  tin  vessel  was 
melted,  and  with  1 17,  a  thin  piece  of  silver.  When 
the  whole  machine  was  employed,  all  the  metals 
and  metallic  minerals  were  melted  at  the  distance 
of  twenty-five  and  even  of  forty  feet.  Wood  was 
kindled  in  a  clear  sky  at  the  distance  of  210  feet.  M. 
Buffon  afterwards  constructed  a  machine  which  con- 
tamed  400  mirrors,  each  six  inches  square,  with  which 
he  could  melt  lead  and  tin  at  the  distance  of  140  feet. 
But  perhaps  the  most  powerful  burning  mirror  ever 
constructed,  was  that  of  Mr.  Parker,  an  eminent  glass 
manufacturer  of  London  ;  it  was  made  in  the  begin- 
ing  of  this  century  by  one  Penn,  an  ingenious  artisan 
of  Islington.  He  erected  an  outhouse  at  the  bottom 
of  his  garden,  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  on  his 
operations,  and  at  length  succeeded  in  producing,  at 
a  cost  of  £700,  a  burning  lens  of  a  diameter  of  three 


142      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

feet,  -whose  powers  were  astonishing.  The  most  hard 
and  solid  substances  of  the  mineral  world,  such  as 
platina,  iron,  steel,  flint,  &c.,  were  melted  in  a  few 
seconds,  on  being  exposed  to  its  immense  focus.  A 
diamond  weighing  ten  grains,  exposed  to  this  lens  for 
thirty  minutes,  was  reduced  to  six  grains,  during 
which  operation  it  opened  and  foliated  like  the 
leaves  of  a  flower,  and  emitted  whitish  fumes  ;  when 
closed  again,  it  bore  a  polish,  and  retained  its  form. 
Ten  cut  garnets,  taken  from  a  bracelet,  began  to  run 
into  each  other  in  a  few  seconds,  and  at  last  formed 
one  globular  garnet.  The  clay  used  by  Wedgewood 
to  make  his  pyronietric  test  ran  in  a  few  seconds  into 
a  white  enamel ;  and  several  specimens  of  lavas,  and 
other  volcanic  productions,  on  being  exposed  to  the 
focus  of  the  lens,  yielded  to  its  power. 

A  subscription  was  proposed  in  London  to  raise 
the  sum  of  700  guineas,  in  order  to  indemnify  the 
inventor  for  the  expense  he  had  incurred  in  its  con- 
struction, and  retain  it  in  England  ;  but,  through  the 
failure  of  the  subscription,  and  other  concurring  cir- 
cumstances, Mr.  Parker  was  induced  to  dispose  of  it 
to  Captain  Mackintosh,  who  accompanied  Lord  Mac- 
artney in  his  celebrated  embassy  to  China ;  and  the 
mirror,  much  to  the  loss  and  regret  of  European 
science,  was  left  at  Pekin. 

MAGNETIC  CORRESPONDENCE  IN  THE  SEVEN- 
TEENTH CENTURY. 
IN  one  of  Addison's  contributions  to  the  Spectator 


MAGNETIC  CORRESPONDENCE.     143 

(No.  241),  we  find  the  following  curious  instance  of 
what  may  almost  be  considered  as  the  foreshadowing 
of  the  electric  telegraph.  It  is  quoted  from  the  writ- 
ings of  Strada,  the  celebrated  Eoman  Jesuit,  who 
died  in  1649.  In  his  "  Prolusiones,"  a  series  of 
polished  Latin  essays  upon  rhetoric  and  literature,  he 
gives  an  account  of  a  chimerical  correspondence  be- 
tween two  friends,  by  the  help  of  a  certain  loadstone, 
which  had  such  virtue  in  it,  that  if  touched  by  two 
several  needles,  when  one  of  the  needles  so  touched 
began  to  move,  the  other,  though  at  ever  so  great  a 
distance,  moved  at  the  same  time  and  in  the  same 
manner.  He  tells  us  that  two  friends,  being  each  of 
them  possessed  of  these  needles,  made  a  kind  of  dial- 
plate,  inscribing  it  with  twenty-four  letters — in  the 
same  manner  as  the  hours  of  the  day  are  marked 
upon  the  ordinary  dial-plate.  They  then  fixed  one 
of  the  needles  on  each  of  these  plates,  in  such  a 
manner  that  it  could  move  round  without  impedi- 
ment so  as  to  touch  any  of  the  twenty-four  letters. 
Upon  their  separating  from  one  another  into  distant 
countries,  they  agreed  to  withdraw  themselves  punc- 
tually into  their  closets  at  a  certain  hour  of  the  day, 
and  to  converse  with  one  another  by  means  of  this 
their  invention.  Accordingly,  when  they  were  some 
hundred  miles  asunder,  each  of  them  shut  himself  up 
in  his  closet  at  the  time  appointed,  and  immediately 
cast  his  eye  upon  his  dial-plate.  If  he  had  a  mind  to 
write  anything  to  his  friend,  he  directed  his  needle 
to  every  letter  that  formed  the  words  that  he  had 
occasion  for — making  a  little  pause  at  the  end  of 


144      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

every  word  or  sentence,  to  avoid  confusion.  The 
friend,  in  the  meanwhile,  saw  his  own  sympathetic 
needle  moving  of  itself  to  every  letter  which  that  of 
his  correspondent  pointed  at.  By  this  means,  they 
talked  together  across  a  whole  continent,  and  con- 
veyed their  thoughts  to  one  another,  in  an  instant, 
over  cities  or  mountains,  seas  or  deserts.  ...  In 
the  meanwhile  (adds  the  Essayist,  playfully),  if  ever 
this  invention  should  be  revived,  or  put  in  practice,  I 
would  propose  that  upon  the  lovers'  dial-plate  there 
should  be  written,  not  only  the  twenty-four  letters, 
but  several  entire  words  which  have  always  a  place 
in  passionate  epistles  ;  as  flames,  darts,  die,  languish, 
absence,  Cupid,  heart,  eyes,  hang,  drown — and  the 
like.  This  would  very  much  abridge  the  lover's  pains 
in  this  way  of  writing  a  letter — as  it  would  enable 
him  to  express  the  most  useful  and  significant  words 
with  a  single  turn  of  the  needle. 


NAVIGATION  BEFORE  THE  COMPASS. 

BEFORE  the  invention  of  the  mariner's  compass,  the 
Phoenician,  the  Greek,  and  the  early  Italian  navi- 
gators were  compelled  to  creep  from  headland  to 
headland,  without  venturing  to  quit  the  shore — except 
when  an  island,  so  near  as  to  be  distinctly  seen  from 
the  continent,  offered  them  an  equally  secure  retreat 
from  the  violence  of  an  accidental  tempest.  Yet,  the 
bolder  Norwegians,  though  exposed  to  far  greater 
perils,  from  the  habitual  inclemency  of  a  high  northern 
latitude,  and  from  the  frequent  cloudiness  of  their 


EARLY  NAVIGATION.  145 

atmosphere,  were  in  the  habit  of  attempting,  and 
often  with  success,  a  voyage  of  some  length  upon  the 
ocean.  It  may  be  supposed  that  a  patient  observa- 
tion of  natural  phenomena,  attention  to  the  flight  of 
migratory  birds  and  to  the  direction  of  currents,  and 
some  few  simple  devices  which,  being  no  longer 
necessary,  are  now  forgotten,  served  as  substitutes 
for  the  more  valuable  guides  of  modern  navigation. 
Of  one  of  the  devices  here  enumerated,  it  is  related 
that  when  Flok,  a  famous  Norwegian  navigator,  was 
about  to  set  out  from  Shetland  for  Iceland,  then 
called  Gardarshohn,  he  took  on  board  some  crows, 
"because  the  mariner's  compass  was  not  yet  in  use." 
When  he  thought  he  had  made  a  considerable  part  of 
his  way,  he  threw  up  one  of  his  crows,  which,  seeing 
land  astern,  flew  to  it ;  whence  Flok,  concluding  that 
he  was  nearer  to  Shetland  (or  perhaps  Faroe)  than 
any  other  land,  kept  on  his  course  for  some  time,  and 
then  sent  out  another  crow,  which,  seeing  no  land  at 
all,  returned  to  the  vessel.  At  last,  having  run  the 
greater  part  of  his  way,  another  crow  was  sent  out 
by  him,  which,  seeing  land  ahead,  immediately  flew 
for  it ;  and  Flok,  following  his  guide,  fell  in  with  the 
east  end  of  the  island.  Such  was  the  simple  mode  of 
steering  their  course,  practised  by  those  bold  navi- 
gators of  the  stormy  northern  ocean.  This  story  at 
once  and  strikingly  recalls  the  use  made  of  birds  by 
the  first  sea  captain  of  whom  we  read — Noah ;  but 
such  expedients  evidently  could  not  be  supposed  to 
have  inspired  the  old  northern  navigators  with  the 
courage  and  confidence  that  enabled  them,  as  there 

K 


146      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

is  reason  to    believe,   to  discover  America    before 
Columbus. 


SEMAPHORE  V.  ELECTRIC  TELEGRAPH. 

AN  anecdote  will  suffice  to  illustrate  the  advantages 
of  the  electric  over  the  visual  variety  of  telegraph — 
the  one  being  only  •workable  in  certain  states  of  the 
weather ;  the  other  available  in  all  states.  Upon 
one  occasion,  when  the  British  army  were  fighting  in 
Spain,  intelligence  was  every  day  feverishly  expected 
from  Wellington  through  the  medium  of  the  sema- 
phore at  the  Admiralty.  Long  delayed,  it  came  at 
last,  and  was  apparently  of  a  fearful  character.  It 
ran  thus  :  "  Wellington  defeated."  Parliament  and 
the  people  were  stunned  for  a  time,  and  rumours  flew 
about  like  wildfire  to  this  effect.  It  turned  out,  how- 
ever, that  just  as  the  word  "defeated"  was  de- 
ciphered, a  fog  intervened,  and  cut  off  the  rest  of 
the  communication.  When  the  dark  pall  disappeared, 
the  bright  sky  disclosed  to  a  jubilant  people,  not 
"Wellington  defeated,"  but  "Wellington  defeated 
—the  French ! " 


A  WRENCH  TO  OLD  ST.  PAUL  S. 

WHEN,  after  much  mean  and  yet  costly  endeavour 
to  patch  up  the  cathedral  of  St.  Paul's,  after  the 
great  fire,  Sir  Christopher  Wren  at  last  had  his  ad- 
vice accepted,  to  rebuild  the  whole  structure,  the 
demolition  of  the  old  fabric  gave  ample  play  to  his 


A  WRENCH  TO  OLD  ST.  PAUL'S.     147 

scientific  knowledge  and  engineering  skill.  One  of 
his  exploits,  perhaps  now  more  remarkable  because 
at  the  time  it  was  at  once  rare  and  bold,  has  thus 
been  described : — "  In  order  that  the  rubbish  and 
old  materials  might  not  hinder  the  setting  out  of  the 
foundations,  for  the  purpose  of  proceeding  with  the 
works,  Sir  Christopher  constructed  scaffolds  high 
enough  to  extend  his  lines  over  the  heaps  that  were 
in  the  way  ;  and  thereby  caused  perpendiculars  to 
be  fixed  upon  the  points  below  for  his  various  walls 
and  piers,  from  lines  drawn  carefully  upon  the  level 
plan  of  the  scaffold.  Thus  he  proceeded,  gaining 
every  day  more  and  more  room,  till  he  came  to  the 
middle  tower  that  formerly  carried  the  lofty  spire. 
The  ruins  of  this  tower  being  nearly  two  hundred 
feet  high,  the  labourers  were  afraid  to  work  above, 
which  induced  him  to  facilitate  the  labour  by  the  use 
of  gunpowder.  To  perform  this  work,  he  caused  a 
hole  to  be  dug,  of  about  four  feet  wide,  by  the  side 
of  the  north-west  pier  of  the  tower,  in  which  was 
perforated  a  hole  two  feet  square,  reaching  to  the 
centre  of  the  pier.  In  this  he  placed  a  small  deal 
box  containing  eighteen  pounds  of  gunpowder.  To 
this  box  he  affixed  a  hollow  cane,  which  contained  a 
quick  match,  reaching  to  the  surface  of  the  ground 
above ;  and  along  the  ground  a  train  of  powder 
was  laid,  with  a  match.  The  mine  was  then  closed 
up,  and  exploded,  while  the  philosophical  architect 
waited  with  confidence  the  result  of  his  experiment. 
This  small  quantity  of  powder  not  only  lifted  up  the 
whole  angle  of  the  tower,  with  two  great  arches  that 


143      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

rested  upon  it,  but  also  two  adjoining  arches  of  the 
aisle,  and  the  masonry  above  them.  This  it  appeared 
to  do  in  a  slow  but  efficient  manner,  cracking  the 
walls  to  the  top,  lifting  visibly  the  whole  weight 
about  nine  inches,  which  suddenly  dropping,  made  a 
great  heap  of  ruins  in  the  place,  without  scatter- 
ing or  accident.  It  was  half  a  minute  before  the 
heap  already  fallen  opened  in  two  or  three  places, 
and  emitted  smoke.  By  this  successful  experiment, 
the  force  of  gunpowder  may  be  ascertained ;  eighteen 
pounds  only  of  which  lifted  up  a  weight  of  more  than 
three  thousand  tons,  and  saved  the  work  of  a  thou- 
sand labourers.  The  fall  of  so  great  a  weight  from  a 
height  of  two  hundred  feet  gave  such  a  concussion 
to  the  ground,  that  the  inhabitants  round  about  took 
it  for  the  shock  of  an  earthquake." 


SXOW  SPECTACLES. 

ELLIS,  in  his  Voyage  to  Hudson's  Bay,  written  in  the 
middle  of  last  century,  says  of  the  Esquimaux: — 
"  Their  snow  eyes,  as  they  very  properly  call  them, 
are  a  proof  of  their  sagacity.  They  are  little  pieces 
of  wood  or  ivory,  properly  formed  to  cover  the 
organs  of  vision,  and  tied  on  behind  the  head.  They 
have  two  slits,  of  the  exact  length  of  the  eyes,  but 
very  narrow ;  and  they  see  through  them  very  dis- 
tinctly, and  without  the  least  inconvenience.  This 
invention  preserves  them  from  snow-blindness,  a 
very  dangerous  and  powerful  malady,  caused  by  the 
action  of  the  light  strongly  reflected  from  the  snow, 


A  SELF-TAUGHT  MECHANIST.        149 

especially  in  the  spring,  when  the  sun  is  considerably 
elevated  above  the  horizon.  The  use  of  these  eyes 
considerably  strengthens  the  sight,  and  the  Esqui- 
maux are  so  accustomed  to  them,  that  when  they  have 
a  mind  to  view  distant  objects,  they  commonly  use 
them  instead  of  spy-glasses." 


A  SELF-TAUGHT  MECHANIST. 

THE  following  description  is  given  of  an  ingenious  and 
singular  piece  of  mechanism — constructed  by  a  boy 
of  the  name  of  John  Young,  who  in  1819  resided  at 
Newton-on-Ayr — which  attracted  much  notice  among 
the  scientific  of  the  day : — "A  box,  about  three  feet 
long  by  two  broad,  and  six  or  eight  inches  deep,  had 
a  frame  and  paper  covering  erected  on  it,  in  the 
form  of  a  house.  On  the  upper  part  of  the  box  are  a 
number  of  wooden  figures,  about  two  or  three  inches 
high,  representing  people  employed  in  those  trades 
and  sciences  with  which  the  boy  is  familiar.  The 
whole  are  put  in  motion  at  the  same  tune  by  ma- 
chinery within  the  box,  acted  upon  by  a  handle  like 
that  of  a  hand-organ.  A  weaver  upon  his  loom,  with 
a  fly-shuttle,  uses  his  hands  and  feet,  and  keeps  his 
eye  upon  the  shuttle,  as  it  passes  across  the  web.  A 
soldier,  sitting  with  a  sailor  at  a  public-house  table, 
fills  a  glass,  drinks  it  off,  then  knocks  upon  the  table, 
upon  which  an  old  woman  opens  a  door,  makes  her 
appearance,  and  they  retire.  Two  shoemakers  upon 
their  stools  are  seen,  the  one  beating  leather,  and  the 
other  stitching  a  shoe.  A  cloth- dresser,  a  stone-cutter, 


150      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

a  cooper,  a  tailor,  a  woman  churning,  and  one  teas- 
ing wool,  are  all  at  work.  There  is  also  a  carpenter 
sawing  a  piece  of  wood,  and  two  blacksmiths  beating 
a  piece  of  iron,  the  one  using  a  sledge,  and  the  other 
a  small  hammer ;  a  boy  turning  a  grindstone,  while 
a  man  grinds  an  instrument  upon  it ;  and  a  barber 
shaving  a  man,  whom  he  holds  fast  by  the  nose  with 
one  hand.  The  boy  was  only  about  seventeen  years 
of  age  when  he  completed  this  curious  work,  and 
since  the  bent  of  his  mind  could  be  first  marked,  his 
only  amusement  was  that  of  working  with  a  knife, 
and  making  little  mechanical  figures.  This  is  the  more 
extraordinary,  as  he  had  no  opportunity  whatever  of 
seeing  any  person  employed  in  a  similar  way.  He 
was  bred  a  weaver  with  his  father,  and  since  he  could 
be  employed  at  the  trade,  has  had  no  time  for  his 
favourite  study,  except  after  the  work  ceased,  or 
during  the  intervals  ;  and  the  only  tool  he  ever  had 
to  assist  him  was  a  pocket-knife.  In  his  earlier  years 
he  produced  several  curiosities  on  a  smaller  scale  ;  but 
the  one  now  described  is  his  greatest  work,  to  which 
he  devoted  all  his  spare  time  during  two  years." 


THE  AMSTERDAM  PILE. 

Ix  an  interesting  report  on  the  "  "\Yaterstaat "  of  the 
Netherlands,  presented  to  the  British  Government,  we 
read  :  "To  appreciate  the  beauty  of  the  Dutch  science 
of  hydrodynamics,  it  is  necessary  to  understand  that, 
from  first  to  last,  it  is  a  question  of  comparative  levels. 
The  error  of  a  centimetre  in  level  might  drown  a  pro- 


THE  PERILS  OF  EXPERIMENT.      151 

vince,  or  frustrate  the  purpose  for  which  some  canal 
had  been  designed.  Thus  it  may  be  said,  without 
exaggeration,  that  the  most  important  institution  in 
the  kingdom  of  the  Netherlands  is  a  certain  anti- 
quated pile  at  Amsterdam — but  one  of  many  million 
pine-trees  brought  from  Norway,  on  which  the  city  is 
perched, — which  indicates  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  outer 
waters  of  the  Zuyder  Zee  and  German  Ocean.  For 
200  years  this  pile  has  been  watched  with  anxiety  by 
the  burghers  of  the  Netherlands,  and  a  graduated 
scale  has  been  marked  upon  it,  in  which  the  mean 
water  level  is  represented  by  zero.  It  is  known  as 
the  '  Amsterdamsche  Peil,'  and  every  hydraulic  un- 
dertaking in  the  country  is  measured  by  its  standard, 
as  having  a  level  of  so  many  metres  or  centimetres 
above  or  below  the  usual  level  of  the  sea.  The  ini- 
tials A.  P.  (Amsterdamsche  Peil),  0.  A.  (Zero  of 
Amsterdam),  or  Z.  P.  (Zero  of  Pile),  are  the  forms 
of  abbreviation  most  generally  used  to  represent  the 
starting-point  in  all  hydraulic  calculations  ;  and  one 
of  these,  with  the  signs  +  and  — ,  must  therefore 
necessarily  occur  in  every  intelligible  description  of 
Dutch  public  works." 


THE  PEEILS  OF  EXPERIMENT. 

M.  ROUELLE,  an  eminent  French  chemist,  was  not 
the  most  cautious  of  operators.  One  day,  while  per- 
forming some  experiments,  he  said  to  his  auditors : 
"  Gentlemen,  you  see  this  cauldron  upon  the  brazier; 
well,  if  I  were  to  cease  stirring  for  one  moment,  an 


152      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

explosion  would  ensue,  that  would  blow  us  all  into 
the  air."  The  audience  had  scarce  had  time  to  re- 
flect on  this  comfortable  piece  of  information,  when 
the  operator  actually  did  forget  to  stir,  and  his  pre- 
diction was  amply  verified.  The  explosion  took  place 
with  a  terrible  crash  ;  all  the  windows  of  the  labora- 
tory were  smashed  to  pieces,  and  two  hundred  auditors 
were  whirled  away  into  the  garden.  Fortunately,  no 
one  received  any  serious  injury,  the  chief  violence  of 
the  explosion  having  been  in  the  direction  of  the  chim- 
ney. The  demonstrator  himself  marvellously  escaped 
without  further  harm  than  the  loss  of  his  wig. — A 
certain  Scotch  Professor — not  of  the  present  genera- 
tion— as  remarkable  for  the  felicity  of  his  experimen- 
tation as  Rouelle  could  be  for  his  failures,  was  once 
performing  an  experiment  with  some  combustible 
materials,  when  the  mixture  exploded,  and  the  phial 
which  he  held  in  his  hand  flew  into  a  thousand 
pieces.  "  Gentlemen,"  said  the  Doctor  to  his  students, 
with  the  most  unaffected  gravity,  "  I  can  assure  you 
that  I  have  performed  this  experiment  often  with  the 
same  phial,  and  never  knew  it  break  in  my  hands 
before."  The  simplicity  of  this  somewhat  superfluous 
assurance  gave  rise  to  a  general  laugh,  in  which  the 
Professor,  instantly  discerning  the  cause  of  it  in  his 
own  excellent  Irishism,  most  heartily  joined. 


THE  SIBERIAN  MAMMOTH  REMAINS. 

ABOUT  40,000  Ibs.  of  fossil  ivory — that  is  to  say,  the 
tusks  of  at  least  100  Mammoths — are  bartered  for 


THE  SIBERIAN  MAMMOTH.          153 

every  year  in  New  Siberia,  so  that  in  a  period  of  200 
years  of  trade  with  that  country,  the  tusks  of  20,000 
Mammoths  must  have  been  disposed  of — perhaps  even 
twice  that  number,  since  only  200  Ibs.  of  ivory  is  cal- 
culated as  the  average  weight  produced  by  one  pair 
of  tusks.  As  many  as  ten  of  these  tusks  have  been 
found  lying  together,  weighing  from  150  to  300  Ibs. 
each.  The  largest  are  rarely  sent  out  of  the  country, 
many  of  them  being  too  rotten  to  be  made  use  of,  while 
others  are  so  large  that  they  cannot  be  carried  away, 
and  are  sawn  up  in  blocks  or  slabs  on  the  spot  with 
very  considerable  waste,  so  that  the  loss  of  weight  in 
the  produce  of  a  tusk  before  the  ivory  comes  to  market 
is  of  no  trifling  amount.  A  large  portion  of  this  ivory 
is  used  by  the  nomad  tribes  in  their  sledges,  arms,  and 
household  implements,  and  formerly  a  great  quantity 
used  to  be  exported  to  China ;  a  trade  which  can  be 
traced  back  to  a  very  distant  period.  Notwithstanding 
the  enormous  amount  already  carried  away,  the  stores 
of  fossil  ivory  do  not  appear  to  diminish ;  in  many 
places  near  the  mouths  of  the  great  rivers  flowing  into 
the  Arctic  Ocean,  the  bones  and  tusks  of  these  antedi- 
luvian pachyderms  lie  scattered  about  like  the  relics  of 
a  ploughed-up  battlefield,  while  in  other  parts  these 
creatures  of  a  former  world  seem  to  have  huddled  to- 
gether in  herds  for  protection  against  the  sudden  de- 
struction that  befell  them,  since  their  remains  are 
found  lying  together  in  heaps.  In  1821,  a  hunter 
from  Yakutsk,  on  the  Lena,  found  hi  the  New  Sibe- 
rian Islands  alone  500  poods  (18,000  Ibs.  English)  of 
Mammoth  tusks,  none  of  which  weighed  more  than 


154      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

3  poods ;  and  this,  notwithstanding  that  another 
hunter  on  a  previous  visit  in  1809  had  brought  away 
with  him  250  poods  of  ivory  from  the  same  islands. 
Entire  mammoths  have  occasionally  been  discovered, 
not  only  with  the  skin  (which  wras  protected  with  a 
double  covering  of  hair  and  wool)  entire,  but  with 
the  fleshy  portions  of  the  body  in  such  a  state  of  pre- 
servation that  they  have  afforded  food  to  dogs  and 
wild  beasts  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  places  where 
they  were  found.  They  appear  to  have  been  sud- 
denly enveloped  in  ice,  or  to  have  sunk  into  mud  which 
was  on  the  point  of  congealing,  and  which,  before  the 
process  of  decay  could  commence,  froze  around  the 
bodies,  and  has  preserved  them  up  to  the  present  time 
in  the  condition  in  which  they  perished.  It  is  thus 
they  are  occasionally  found  when  a  landslip  occurs  in 
the  frozen  soil  of  the  Siberian  coast,  which  never  thaws, 
even  during  the  greatest  heat  of  the  summer,  to  a  depth 
of  more  than  2  feet ;  and  in  this  way,  within  a  period 
of  a  century  and  a  half,  five  or  six  of  these  curious 
corpses  have  come  to  light  from  their  icy  graves.  A 
very  perfect  specimen  of  the  Mammoth  in  this  state 
was  discovered  in  the  autumn  of  1865,  near  the 
mouth  of  the  Jenissei ;  an  expedition  was  despatched 
to  the  spot  by  the  Imperial  Academy  of  Sciences  in 
the  summer  of  1866,  and  the  result  of  that  expedi- 
tion, it  is  considered,  will  be  the  disclosure  of  some  in- 
teresting facts  in  the  natural  history  of  a  former  crea- 
tion.— Mr.  Lumley's  Report  on  Russian  Trade. 


VELOCITY  OF  ELECTRICITY.       155 


VELOCITY  OF  ELECTKICITY. 

ONE  of  our  most  profound  electricians  is  reported  to 
have  exclaimed,  "  Give  me  but  an  unlimited  length 
of  wire,  with  a  small  battery,  and  I  will  girdle  the 
universe  with  a  sentence  in  forty  minutes."  Yet  this 
is  no  vain  boast ;  for  so  rapid  is  the  transit  of  the 
electric  current  along  the  lines  of  the  telegraph  wire, 
that,  supposing  it  were  possible  to  carry  the  wires 
eight  times  round  the  earth,  it  would  but  occupy  one 
second  of  time.  The  immense  velocity  of  electricity 
makes  it  impossible  to  calculate  it  by  direct  observa- 
tion ;  it  would  require  to  be  many  thousands  of 
leagues  long  before  the  result  could  be  expressed  in 
the  fractions  of  a  second.  Yet  Professor  Wheatstone 
devised  some  apparatus  for  this  purpose,  among 
which  was  a  double  metallic  mirror,  to  which  he  gave 
a  velocity  of  eight  hundred  revolutions  in  a  second  of 
time.  The  Professor  concluded,  from  his  experiments 
with  this  apparatus,  that  the  velocity  of  electricity 
through  a  copper  wire,  one-fifteenth  of  an  inch  thick, 
exceeds  the  velocity  of  light  across  the  planetary 
spaces  ;  that  it  is  at  least  288,000  miles  per  second. 
The  Professor  adds,  that  the  light  of  electricity,  in  a 
state  of  great  intensity,  does  not  last  the  millionth 
part  of  a  second ;  but  that  the  eye  is  capable  of  dis- 
tinctly perceiving  objects  which  present  themselves 
for  this  short  space  of  time. 


15G      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 


MONOCHROMATIC  PAINTING. 

A  VERY  delicate  experiment,  yet  a  very  natural  one, 
which  Buffon  appears  to  have  first  noticed,  led  in  all 
probability  to  the  invention  of  the  monochromatic 
mode  of  painting,  or  painting  with  a  single  colour. 
If,  at  the  moment  which  precedes  sunset,  at  the  close 
of  a  cloudless  day,  a  body  is  placed  near  a  wall,  or 
against  another  polished  body,  or  on  a  smooth  chalky 
soil,  the  shadow  carried  by  this  body  is  blue,  instead 
of  being  black  or  colourless.  This  effect  is  produced 
by  the  light  of  the  sun  being  so  weakened,  that  the 
blue  rays  which,  are  reflected  from  the  sky — which 
has  always  this  colour  on  a  clear  day — fall,  and  are 
again  driven  back  or  reflected  on  that  part  of  the 
wall  which  the  dying  light  of  the  sun  cannot  strike  ; 
for  even  at  its  last  moment,  the  light  which  falls 
straight  and  direct,  is  sufficiently  strong  to  destroy 
that  of  the  heavens,  which  is  only  reflected,  wherever 
they  meet. 


THE  MARINER  S  COMPASS. 

THE  time  at  which  the  attractive  property  of  the 
magnet  was  discovered,  is  by  no  means  known ; 
certain,  however,  it  is,  that  mankind  were  acquainted 
with  it  at  a  very  early  period.  Father  Kircher  en- 
deavours to  prove  that  the  Jews  were  aware  of  the 
magnet's  singular  property  of  attracting  iron ;  and 
from  Plutarch,  it  appears  that  the  Egyptians  were 


THE  MARINERS  COMPASS.          157 

not  ignorant  of  it.  Pythagoras,  Ptolemy,  and  seve- 
ral other  ancient  philosophers,  knew  and  admired 
this  wonderful  property  of  the  magnet.  Thales  and 
Anaxagoras  were  so  struck  with  it,  as  to  imagine  that 
the  magnet  had  a  soul ;  and  Plato  said  that  the  cause 
of  its  attraction  was  divine.  But  the  directive  pro- 
perty of  the  magnet  was  not  known  to  the  ancients. 
To  the  simple  application  of  this  property,  which  was 
either  discovered  or  introduced  into  Europe  about 
500  years  ago,  mankind  is  indebted  principally  for 
the  discovery  of  a  new  continent  nearly  equal  to  the 
old  one,  for  an  extensive  commerce  between  the  most 
distant  nations,  and  for  an  accurate  knowledge  of  the 
shape  and  size  of  the  world  we  inhabit.  The  use  of 
the  magnetic  needle  was  not  known  in  Europe  before 
the  thirteenth  century.  The  honour  of  its  discovery 
has  been  much  contested ;  but  by  the  consent  of 
most  writers,  it  seems  to  belong  to  Flavio  Gioja  of 
Amain.  He  lived  in  the  reign  of  Charles  of  Anjou, 
who  died  in  1309  ;  and  it  was,  it  is  said,  in  compli- 
ment to  this  Sovereign  that  Gioja  distinguished  the 
North  Pole  by  the  emblem  of  France,  the  fleur-de-lis. 
Du  Halde,  in  his  book  upon  China,  indeed,  intimates 
that  the  use  of  the  magnetic  needle  was  known  to  the 
ancient  Chinese.  Speaking  of  the  Emperor  Hoang-ti, 
when  he  gave  battle  to  Tchi-Yeou,  he  says :  "  He, 
perceiving  that  thick  fogs  saved  the  enemy  from  his 
pursuit,  and  that  the  soldiers  rambled  out  of  the  way 
and  lost  the  course  of  the  wind,  made  a  car  which 
showed  them  the  four  cardinal  points.  By  this 
method  he  overtook  Tchi-Yeou,  made  him  prisoner, 


1 58      INVENTION  AND  DISCO  VER Y. 

and  put  him  to  death.  Some  say  that  there  were 
engraven  on  this  car,  on  a  plate,  the  characters  of  a 
rat  and  a  horse,  and  underneath  was  placed  a  needle 
to  determine  the  four  parts  of  the  world.  This  would 
amount  to  the  use  of  the  compass,  or  something  near 
it,  being  of  great  antiquity  and  well  attested."  In 
another  place,  speaking  of  certain  ambassadors,  Du 
Halde  says :  "  After  they  had  their  audience  of  leave, 
in  order  to  return  to  their  own  country,  Tcheou-Kong 
gave  them  an  instrument,  which  on  one  side  pointed 
towards  the  north,  and  on  the  opposite  side  towards 
the  south,  to  direct  them  better  on  the  way  home, 
than  they  had  been  directed  in  coining  to  China.  The 
instrument  was  called  Tchi-ran,  which  is  the  same 
name  as  the  Chinese  now  call  the  sea-compass  by ; 
this  has  given  occasion  to  think  that  Tcheou-Kong 
was  the  inventor  of  the  compass."  This  happened  in 
the  twenty-second  cycle,  about  1040  years  before 
Christ ;  but,  notwithstanding  the  assertions  of  Du 
Halde,  strong  reasons  have  been  adduced  against  the 
mariner's  compass  being  known  among  the  ancient 
people  of  China  and  of  Arabia.  The  French  also 
have  laid  claim  to  the  discovery  of  the  compass,  and 
in  tbe  Imperial  Library  at  Paris  there  is  a  poem, 
contained  in  a  curious  quarto  manuscript  of  the  thir- 
teenth century,  on  vellum,  in  which  the  mariner's 
compass  is  evidently  mentioned  ;  but  still  it  appears 
that  the  Neapolitan,  Flavio  Gioja,  if  not  the  original 
discoverer,  was  at  least  the  first  who  used  the  mari- 
ner's compass,  or  constructed  it  for  the  use  of  vessels 
in  the  Mediterranean. 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  LITHOGRAPHY,  159 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  LITHOGRAPHY. 

THE  invention,  or  more  properly  the  discovery,  of 
lithography,  claims  a  high  rank  among  those  of  the  pre- 
sent age,  on  account  of  its  extensive  usefulness.  The 
honour  of  the  invention  belongs  to  Alois  Sennefelder, 
originally  a  performer  at  the  Theatre  Royal  of  Munich. 
He  had  conceived  the  idea  of  etching  on  stone  instead 
of  on  copper,  and  was  proceeding  to  make  the  ex- 
periment, when  an  accidental  discovery  gave  a  more 
beneficial  turn  to  his  speculations.  The  discovery, 
•which  was  that  of  the  lithographic  art,  has  been  thus 
narrated  by  Sennefelder  himself  : — 

"  I  had  just  succeeded,  in  my  little  laboratory,  in 
polishing  a  stone  plate,  which  I  intended  to  cover 
with  etching  ground,  when  my  mother  entered  the 
room,  and  desired  me  to  write  her  a  bill  for  the  washer- 
woman, who  was  waiting  for  the  linen.  I  happened 
not  to  have  even  the  smallest  slip  of  paper  at  hand, 
as  my  little  stock  of  paper  had  been  entirely  exhausted 
by  taking  proof  impressions  from  the  stones  ;  nor  was 
there  even  a  drop  of  ink  in  the  inkstand.  As  the 
matter  would  not  admit  of  delay,  and  we  had  nobody 
in  the  house  to  send  for  a  supply  of  the  deficient 
materials,  I  resolved  to  write  the  list  with  my  ink 
prepared  with  wax,  soap,  and  lamp-black,  on  the 
stone  which  I  had  just  polished,  and  from  which  I 
could  copy  it  at  leisure. 

"Some  time  after  this,  I  was  going  to  wipe  this 
writing  from  the  stone,  when  the  idea,  all  at  once, 


160      INVENTION  AND  DISCOVERY. 

struck  me  to  try  what  would  be  the  effect  of  such  a 
writing  with  my  prepared  ink  if  I  were  to  bite  it  in 
the  stone  with  aquafortis ;  and  whether,  perhaps,  it 
might  not  be  possible  to  apply  printing  ink  to  it  in 
the  same  way  as  to  wood  engravings,  and  to  take 
impressions  from  it."  Sennefelder  surrounded  the 
stone  with  a  border  of  wax,  and  applied  aquafortis, 
by  which  in  a  feAV  minutes  the  writing  was  raised. 
Printing  ink  was  then  applied  with  a  common  printer's 
ball,  impressions  were  taken  off,  and  the  practicability 
of  the  important  art  of  lithography  thus  was  fully 
established. 

The  first  application  of  the  art  to  purposes  of  use- 
fulness unconnected  with  the  fine  arts,  was  made  by 
the  Duke  of  "Wellington  in  the  Peninsular  War,  for 
the  purpose  of  rapidly  multiplying  copies  of  general 
orders,  instructions,  etc.,  and  accompanying  them 
with  sketches  of  positions.  It  has  since  been  intro- 
duced into  the  public  offices  of  almost  every  state  in 
Europe ;  and  its  uses  in  every  department  of  commer- 
cial, social,  and  artistic  activity  are  innumerable. 


THE  END. 


MURRAY  AND  GIBB.  EDINBURGH, 
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